


Magnitogorsk

by pr_scatterbrain



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Changelings, Found Family, M/M, Multi, Werewolves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-26
Updated: 2017-08-26
Packaged: 2018-12-20 03:34:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 30,971
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11912352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pr_scatterbrain/pseuds/pr_scatterbrain
Summary: The possibility of the Lost Fae Prince being in Russia, a world away from the front lines of the war effort, doesn’t feel real to Evgeni. Fae don’t just disappear. They leave great battles victorious and take up a seat at a royal court amidst great fanfare and next to no care about the aftermath they leave in their wake. That is what they do. That is what they always have done.A supernatural au with werewolves, mystics, a lost fae prince, magic, vague prophecies and a war that is in the process of being lost.





	Magnitogorsk

**Author's Note:**

> This verse has been a wip for a very long time. During that time I think I annoyed everyone I know about it. Special thanks goes to Rae (masterpenguin) and Sarah. Getting to this point would not have happened without their help and support. Rae was also generous enough to beta this. Thank you both so much. *hugs and hearts*
> 
> I would also like to thank Leah (Taste_Is_Sweet) who made the utterly gorgeous and atmospheric art to accompany this. Thank you so much for making such beautiful images. They really enhances the story. You can (and totally should) check it out here: [here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/11668233)

 

 

**2004-2005**

**Moscow, Russia.**

_‘Some stories you carry around in your heart. Others live in the throat, in the skull, in the fangs — all worthy places, too.’_

 Natalia Antonova, ‘His Sin, Her Soul’ from _The Second Pass._

__

 

 

There is no news when Alex wakes in the morning.

No messages, no birds waiting to sing, not even someone needing an extra ruble or two to line their pockets. Just stillness; stale air and low hanging cloud cover in the sky. The light that spills through his bedroom windows and over his aching shoulders is weak. It’s not anything worth getting up for, but he does anyway. The days keep getting shorter. Scrubbing a hand through his hair, he changes into a clean shirt and hopes that’s enough. It’s already late; his mother would be displeased if she could see him.

It’s been six days since Alex heard anything at all from his sources. It’s been far longer since they told him anything he didn’t already know. Alexander Semin – Sasha, dear Sasha – tells him to be patient, but Alex doesn’t see anything when he closes his eyes so the sentiment is lost on him.

Sasha is already up. From his room, Alex can hear the soft sound of him padding around the suite of rooms Alex keeps. The kettle is beginning to whistle as Alex stumbles out into the kitchen. Perfect timing.

“No change,” Sasha tells Alex absently, refreshing the news app on his tablet.

Alex makes a face. State updates. Enough said. He doesn’t know why Sasha insists on checking them each day. Personally, Alex finds them insufferable. Risk charts and fault line news – it’s been almost six months of nothing. The borders between the New and Old worlds are closed. Alex would wager his entire life savings the ley lines will still be shut tomorrow.

Sasha narrows his eyes. “The borders aren’t shut.”

“Then go take the Miami Beach holiday you’ve been talking about taking,” Alex tells him, shoving two slices of bread in the toaster. “What are you waiting for?”

“Screw you,” Sasha swears. “What do you call the talk then?”

“Information doesn’t have to be true for people to believe it, Sasha,” Alex reminds him. “Or for people to try and sell it.”

“Don’t,” Sasha tells him.

Alex snorts. He can act any way he wishes. That’s already been proven, as has the fact that there are always rumours. Always have been, always will be. He isn’t a kid anymore. He isn’t going to head off into the wilderness at the first mention of a rogue rusalka sighting off the coastline. His mother might despair over him, but she did manage to teach him to not take things at face value.

Sasha sighs. Picking up his plate and empty glass, he puts them into the dishwasher.  “Try not to act like that when Ilya arrives.”

“Ilya?”

Sasha nods. “He’s back from the north.”

“What does he want now?”

Sasha shrugs. “Says he’s bringing us good tidings.”

“Little late for that.”

“Probably,” Sasha agrees. “But you never know.”

 

 

While everyone is more or less killing time with the fault lines closed, Ilya Bryzgalov has somehow managed to keep himself occupied. Alex doesn’t know how. Occasionally there have been the odd skirmishing between packs and fractions; werewolves straying past territory lines or water nymphs luring humans into their waters, but nothing real. Nothing that counts. The last true battle on continental soil was almost three decades ago. It was there his mother made her name. Alex grew up hearing about her glory days. All school kids did; all dreaming of one day fighting the same fight. To say dealing with the petty politics of bickering wolves and bored nymphs isn’t what he expected would be an understatement.

His mother tells him to be grateful, but she also tells that to all her new recruits, unexpected finds, and underlings.

When Ilya turns up, he grins as he makes himself home; snagging a piece of toast from Alex’s plate and pouring himself a cup of coffee.

No one is quite sure about Ilya. Alex suspects he has a bit of pre-cog about him. Not enough to set off any detectors and get himself conscripted to do paperwork for the local police station or hospital, but enough to make his instincts sharper than a normal human, enough to allow him to know when to turn left and when to turn right and let him land on his feet again and again. 

“Miss me?” Ilya asks as he settles at the head of Alex’s table.

Alex shakes his head. “No. Not at all.”

“Liar,” Ilya grins.

Alex laughs. “Why would I lie? I can’t stand your face.”

“So harsh,” Ilya says. “It’s like you don’t want me to tell you what I heard.”

From the corner of Alex’s eye, he tracks Sasha’s reaction. Standing quietly by the counter with his head cocked to the side, Sasha is waiting.

Alex has been waiting too – they all have. If Ilya’s heard something, Alex wants to know.

Ilya’s grin turns into a smug smirk. He knows Alex too well.

“How much?” Alex asks, getting down to it.

“For a friend? Nothing.”

“Nothing?”

Everything has a cost – and everyone knows that. 

Ilya shrugs. “Perhaps you will remember my generosity in the future.”

For a demand, it’s a good one. Ilya always had a way with words and requesting an unspecified favour is perfectly in character. 

“Perhaps,” Alex allows.

“No promise?”

“I don’t know if it’s worth it.”

Ilya leans close. “It’s worth it.”

He grins. His smile is all charm and too many teeth.

“Let me be the judge of that.”

Ilya nods, but he is too satisfied for Alex to take his agreement for anything other than a jest. Ilya is always confident; whether he is trading news or bootleg Taylor Swift albums. 

“There is an auction being organised.”

At the word ‘auction,’ Sasha shifts. Alex is more careful. “And?”

“There is an item that you may be interested in.”

“A Mercedes-Benz SL65 AMG69 in matte black?” Alex jokes, exchanging a look with Sasha.

Ilya shakes his head. “Better.”

“What could be better than that?”

Ilya takes a large bite of Alex’s piece of toast, and chews it with his mouth open. “A fae.”

Alex scoffs. “A fae?”

There haven’t been any fae in Northern Europe since the seventeen hundreds. Empress Yekaterina Alexeyevna’s court was famed for their presence, among other things. Her death coincided with their disappearance – as all school children know. Ilya would have done better trying to sell Alex on a unicorn.

Sensing Alex’s disbelief, Ilya frowns. “You can doubt me, but they have one.”

 

 

Sasha is quiet for a long time after Ilya departs. Alex brushes off his concern before he can truly feel it. Sasha can act however he wishes.

A fae. The likelihood of traders having one is so minute it isn’t even worth entertaining.

Alex might be killing time, but he isn’t wasting it.

That would be it, only at Alex’s second favourite club, the one under the subway station, a strung out shifter sides up to Alex and whispers about it – the fae –  about how it is golden and how certain people are being issued invitations for private showings, how it is _lost._  

Alex stills.

The shifter sways a little. Her eyes wide and bright. High as a kite.

 _She can’t know_ , Alex reminds himself. _It isn’t common knowledge._

Behind him, Alex hears his name being called.

Alex makes himself leave without looking back.

 

 

“It’s probably nothing,” Alex tells Sasha on the cab drive back to Alex’s place.

People are talking, but that’s partly because there is so little to talk about.

Sasha nods. “Yeah.”

And it usually isn’t. Normally it’s a pretty sprit or a succubi. Sometimes it isn’t anything at all.

If there is any specific talk… well, people like to talk about myth and magic. It’s the life blood of the underground. That is what black marketers and traders are relying upon; probably why Alex has heard the rumours of a fae and an action. Alex isn’t anonymous. His name and his face are known. His power too.

Despite knowing that, he finds himself turning to Sasha.

In fits and starts the streetlights from outside the taxi illuminate him golden and true. Alex has known Sasha since they were both teenagers. He was made for more than this too. Alex has always known that. And Alex can’t help but feel the prickle of something touch his mind; what if…

With words spoken only for Sasha, Alex is careful.  “Is there anything I should know?”

“It doesn’t work like that,” Sasha reminds him.

“You,” Alex corrects, affectionately bumping his shoulder into Sasha’s. “You don’t work like that.”

“No. I don’t.”

And Alex knows that, just as Sasha knows that Alex has to check if there is any truth in the rumour, just to know.

“If I knew anything, I’d tell you,” Sasha sighs softly.

“I know,” Alex tells him, because Sasha would. If Sasha saw anything, Alex would be the first one to know. But Sasha hasn’t, not for a long time.

It’s been months since his last vision. Almost a year. Alex knows they come and go. Mysticism isn’t an exact science. However Sasha’s never had a dry spell as long as this one.

Alex wonders if he should be worried, or grateful.

“If we’re going to make a move, we need to make it soon,” Sasha says, breaking the silence between them.

Alex nods. “Yeah.”

 

 

When they get back to Alex’s place, Sasha pours them two glasses of water while Alex bites the bullet and calls Evgeni.

He doesn’t answer.

 _Fuck him,_ Alex thinks, pressing the redial button.

 

 

When Evgeni deigns to answer his mobile, Alex almost – well, when it comes to Evgeni, nothing is out of the question.

“What?” Evgeni asks.

“Is that any way to great your old friend?”

Evgeni snorts.

Alex grits his teeth. “I need a favour.”

“A favour? Really?” Evgeni asks incredulously. “From me?”

“Yes, from you,”

If there was anyone else close to the traders – Alex stops himself. He knows better than to lie to himself. He knows exactly why he is calling Evgeni. Evgeni won’t – Evgeni never does. However, even if that wasn’t true, Alex would still probably ask Evgeni. It’s embarrassing, but true.

“There is an auction–”

Evgeni snarls.

Alex rolls his eyes. Wolves. “I need you to investigate. There has been word of a fae.”

“Fae don’t get caught,” Evgeni tells him.

“Fae can’t be kept,” Alex corrects.

There is a difference. The myths all make a point of it.

“Do you think–?”

Alex doesn’t know what he thinks. The lost fae – there is no way a random shifter would know. Alex wouldn’t even know if his mother hadn’t told him.

Evgeni sucks in a breath. “Sanja, do you think it’s him?”

Evgeni’s voice is incredulous - rumours are rumours. Alex knows this. He can’t help but think of the shifter. She couldn’t have known. The files are still classified. Evgeni shouldn’t even know about the lost fae. He wouldn’t, if Alex wasn’t so stupid and the thing is, it isn’t out of the question that two rumours could be combined into one. A fae turning up after one _, the_ _one_ , the changeling prince, disappeared in the heat of battle months ago.

“It could be nothing,” he says.

“But it could be–?”

“ _It could be nothing_ ,” Alex tells him.

Evgeni is quiet. “I’ll go. Tell me where and I’ll go.”

Alex knew he would.

The two of them might not be on speaking terms, but Alex knows Evgeni. Evgeni is a good man. A good person.

 

 

(Alex knows what kind of man he is too. He isn’t like Evgeni. He doesn’t have that luxury anymore.

There is a reason Evgeni doesn’t trust him.)

 

 

 

**Magnitogorsk, Ural Mountains, Russia.**

_My bones do not taste of crown and silver_

_I am not a thing to be owned_

Adonis, _This is My Name_.

 

 

When Evgeni ends the call, he exhales slowly. In the cold, his breath is icy and hangs suspended in the air. Through the thick concrete walls of the club, Evgeni hears one track slide into the next and feels the thump of the base line go through him. As the wind picks up, he can feel the alcohol burning out of his system.

It’s both late and early and inside his chest his heart beats loudly; quick to betray him like always.

Stupid heart. Stupid him, for answering Alex’s call despite everything that has happened.

And now this, now a secret is in his chest. Placed there by Alex, who always knows just the right things to say to get under his skin.

Evgeni doesn’t like secrets. This… the pack should know.

 

 

(There are a lot of things the pack should know but doesn’t).

 

 

Two hours later, Alex sends coordinates.

The location, when Evgeni marks it out, is more than two days travel from the Metallurg’s territory of Magnitogorsk and into outskirts of Chelyabinsk.

Alex does not know what he is asking.

(He never does.)

In summer Chelyabinsk would be a day’s drive at most. With winter nearly upon them, the hours of daylight grow shorter and greyer. A week ago it started snowing on and off. The Metallurg pack leaders are already talking about closing down the unsafe back roads. It isn’t wise to use them even with snow tires on his car, but he does anyway.

Evgeni might be a wolf, but he isn't Alex's dog. Though either way, fuck if Alex isn’t good at getting Evgeni to do what he wants. He always knows what buttons to push. Maybe it was fun when they were kids, but it isn’t now. Inside his chest, Evgeni tries to pace himself. It isn’t something that comes easily or naturally. It’s been hours since he heard the ochre of Alex’s voice and the easy way he said his name. Hours and Evgeni makes himself tightly grip the steering wheel in order to prevent his hands from trembling. It’s been months since he left Moscow. Months.

There is a reason Evgeni came home.

There is a reason his brother and his closest friend, Nikolay Kulemin, worry for him.

“It will pass,” Denis said, when Evgeni returned to the pack with only the tatters of his heart left inside his chest.

Evgeni hadn’t believed him. He had tried to laugh, but whatever sound he made must not have sounded like it.

It was Nikolay who believed Denis.

“I promise it will,” he had told Evgeni. “We will make it so.”

And they had tried.

In the fury that had come later, Evgeni had perhaps thought they had managed it.

Yet here he is, driving through the night to make it on time to meet his Traktor contact.

When he gets within fifty kilometres of Chelyabinsk, Evgeni pulls over to the side of the highway and waits. The longer the wait, the better; Evgeni knows this.

Years ago the Traktor pack hosted Sasha for a season, but that was before Alex claimed him – for that Evgeni is glad. He wouldn’t want him here now.

Chelyabinsk is not Magnitogorsk.

Though both cities are in the Ural Mountain region and are technically part of the same feudal subject, Chelyabinsk forms part of the currently disputed Traktor territory. Word never travels fast or far in the mountains. Everyone knows about the infighting, but no one knows the details. The last anyone heard, the old pack lines were threatening to be redrawn and there were rumours of fractions being formed and a power grab being planned. ‘Anyone’ being the neighbouring packs. Maybe no politician in Moscow wants to, or is willing to admit that, but they rarely venture into the country. As long as the pack sends steel out of their mills and enough young wolves are recruited to the Military Reserves, no one does.

When it comes to pack territory, it is deeper than any lines drawn on a map. Never static, it’s shifted and changed over the centuries. Territory is still fought over now.

Muscovites don’t understand that.

In Chelyabinsk there have long been fractures in the Traktor pack. 

As the seconds tick over into minutes, Evgeni's nerves build rather than dissipate.

Around three quarters of an hour later, Evgeni is caught off guard when his vision is blinded by a wash of headlights. Glancing at his driver’s side mirror, he makes himself breathe when his passenger door opens and Sergei Plotnikov steps inside. Tall, and solemn, Plotnikov pulls off his knitted hat, leather gloves and untangles his long scarf from around his neck. As he does, Evgeni unclench his hands from the steering wheel one white knuckle finger at a time and turns up the heating and puts his car into gear.

“There isn’t going to be anything there,” Evgeni tells him, feeling like the pup neither of them have been for a while now.

Plotnikov nods. “Probably not.”

Within the black-market community, there are several different levels of criminal activity. During the bad days Evgeni’s mother and father used to barter for good meat and spare parts for their car. Sometimes in winter, they would get in touch with certain people to arrange to buy flu medicine and the like. Times are better now – wolves aren’t subject to the same restrictions of movement – but the black-market still does good trade. But there is a difference between dealers who sell bootlegged liquor and penicillin, and traders.

Growing up, Evgeni was told stories; stories of traders who stole cubs and the buyers who wanted a particular kind of pet. Evgeni isn’t sure how much truth there is in any of them. The only truth he knows is no one likes traders. They are bad business. As many times as they chase them off, the traders always seem to find their way back into the mountains. The thought of them near his pack’s territory makes Evgeni’s skin prickle. Even an eighteen hour drive away from Magnitogorsk too close.

Plotnikov too, is clearly on edge. As they drive closer and closer and finally into town, he becomes tenser and tenser. He has cubs of his own. During spring they arrived – soft fluff and huge paws.

When they stop for fuel, Plotnikov takes a call. From the pump, Evgeni watches out of the corner of his eye.

Like Evgeni, Plotnikov isn’t unknown in Moscow. For his age, he is exceptionally strong. He is also tremendously brave, clever, and level headed. A few decades ago they maybe might have been shield brothers. Now they are both officially listed on the Reserves. The likelihood of being called into active duty is debatable, especially with the ley lines closed.

Here, in the edges of the empire, they are known and chosen by their packs. That is something Evgeni understands the weight of. And it is a weight. They both know that.

They are friends – the two of them have been friends for a while now – and Evgeni feels confident saying he knows Plotnikov. Right now, there is something about the way Plotnikov’s shoulders are set that makes Evgeni worry. When Plotnikov gets off the phone, he exhales slowly like he is pacing himself. Evgeni wonders what he knows. They are friends, yes, but they are not pack mates. Loyalty only runs so deep.

“It’s nothing,” Plotnikov says, without being prompted when he gets back into the car.

He isn’t a liar, but that is a lie.

“I can’t turn around,” Evgeni admits.

“I know.”

There are different kinds of loyalty; they both know that.

It doesn’t matter who or what they find or don’t find. They cannot stop. They must know either way.

And Evgeni doesn’t change his mind except when he gets there –

Nothing is an easy as Alex makes it sound. This is no different.

Walls might fall, royalty goes to rags, but the old regime holds strong and their networks run deep.

There is nothing for it.

Upon arrival Plotnikov takes Evgeni to a bar. It’s out of the way as much as a bar in a pack town can be. Tucked away, between a seamstress shop and a vacant store, inside it smells of cigarette smoke and stale beer. They order three drinks and by the time they are served a cousin of a cousin of Plotnikov’s (which could mean anything) appears and takes a seat. Her name is Fanuza Kadirova and she’s a runner.

“Young, but an up and comer,” Plotnikov says when he first sees her.

In person Evgeni wouldn’t be able to say either way, but that’s often the way with wolves like her.

“Who sent her?”

Plotnikov shrugs.

That’s an answer, Evgeni supposes, as is the way Fanuza pretends she didn’t hear every word of their conversation. She arrives with her tawny coloured hair is tucked underneath the collar of her coat. Before she takes her drink she peels it and her thick gloves off. As she does, Evgeni notices, the skin stretched over her knuckles is red, and dry. Fragile. Almost.

“Good to see you too,” she says.

Plotnikov nods.

Sitting at the back of a random bar, she nurses her drink and smokes her way through half a pack of cigarettes before she nods and unofficially implies that she knows what Evgeni’s talking about.

“You are not the only arrival this month,” she says neutrally.

His pack would never accept traders on their territory, but Fanuza and Plotnikov aren’t part of his pack. Their pack and the politics within it are mostly unknown to Evgeni. If they know the traders are on their territory, then there is a reason why they are still there. Evgeni knows that. He also knows whatever reasons they have would change if they knew about the traders possibly having a fae.

“Are they also visiting old friends?” Evgeni asks.

“Not so much.”

“Making new ones?” Plotnikov suggests.

Plotnikov’s expression is impossible to read. Somehow that in itself is a response and Fanuza shrugs; flippant in a way that speaks volumes.

Evgeni waits, but that is all either offers.

“The roads are dangerous,” she tells him finally, finishing her drink. “You should get home before they close for winter.”

Polite, Evgeni acknowledges. He can see why she was sent to welcome him.

He can be polite as well.

He waves down a waitress and orders another round.

“Generous,” she comments.

He nods. When he is ready, he asks, “What if I wanted to stay a while?”

She smiles.

No one knows her in Moscow, but in the pit of Evgeni’s stomach, the feral part of him knows that they should. If they were wise, they would memorise her name and her face.

“You can take your chances, if you wish,” she tells him. “However I wouldn’t recommend it.”

It isn’t quite a threat, but it isn’t the kind of statement one should ignore.

Evgeni isn’t careful.

No one would ever say he is, but he has to be now.

He leans back in the both and lets some of the tension in his body go. “I think I’ll stay. Maybe I like it here. I haven’t seen Seryozha in too long.”

Fanuza finishes the last of her drink and smiles. “We make our own choices.”

“We do,” Evgeni agrees.

It is both the truth and a lie.

 

 

(Afterwards when Fanuza has departed and they are alone in the parking lot Plotnikov’s breathing goes shallow and his hands become fists that he presses to his eyes.

“Fuck,” he says. “Fuck, fuck, fuck. They knew. They know.”

They did. They do.

“A fucking month,” Plotnikov swears. “Traders have been in our territory for a fucking month.”

Evgeni holds himself steady. He does not say a word.

Plotnikov has pups. Only a few months old, they are tiny and soft and sweet and terribly, terribly vulnerable. 

When he strides to the far end of the parking lot, Evgeni knows it’s to call his wife. As he does, Evgeni pointedly gets into the car and turns on the radio so there is no chance he can overhear their conversation.)

 

 

There are formal channels and there are informal ones.

In a pack as fractured as the Traktor’s, Evgeni doesn’t trust either but he does trust Plotnikov. Together he and his wife, Maria, work through their network of trusted sources for independent confirmation and for an in with the traders. It requires a light touch and time. Time that Evgeni isn’t sure if they have. Or time he may not have. Although he feels welcome in the Plotnikov home, he doesn’t in Chelyabinsk. At night he hears howls and there are long shadows cast from flickering street lights.

“Stupid wolves,” Maria, says.

“Better to hear them, than not to.”

She stills. Her pale blonde fringe is getting long, and it half covers her eyes. After a beat, she nods. “Yes, better to hear them.”

Evgeni doesn’t know how many favours they call and how many they offer. He doesn’t ask and they don’t tell him. It takes time, but one of their pack mate’s connections comes through. Somehow they manage to set them up as security. It’s a major coup. Alex may have given coordinates, but that wasn’t a plan.

“Thank you,” Evgeni tells them when they turn up with ID cards and uniforms.

Later Plotnikov shakes his head.

“I was being polite,” Evgeni tells him.

“You didn’t need to be. Not to them.”

Evgeni should have known that.

Pack hierarchies might be unsaid but they are known to all – or at least to Traktor weres.

“Metallurg manners,” Maria comments absently. “Best forget them.”

She’s probably right.

 

 

The traders have set up shop in an abandoned soviet bunker in Chebarkul, a small town around fifty kilometres from Chelyabinsk. From ground level the base is unimpressive. Time hasn’t been kind. Most of the surrounding infrastructure is in various stages of ruin. Wildlife has made a home in what's left of the hanger. Trees have taken root. Their roots have broken through the concrete airfield and driveway. The suspension of Plotnikov’s car groans as he drives over them.

As they draw closer, Evgeni picks up the sound of white noise as the current rotation of security note their arrival. From a glance, Evgeni places them as mostly human. In their hands, their radios crackle. There isn’t a mobile tower for miles. There must be interference from something buried deep underground.

“What was here?”

Plotnikov hums a little. “No one knows, exactly.”

Something was. Maybe not recently, but in the not so distant past, something was here.

“Nuclear?”

“Probably.”

Shifting gears, Plotnikov approaches the entrance of the bunker.

The true scale of the bunker only unfolds when they are let inside. The chill that comes off the concrete surrounds them and intensified as they go further underground. The deeper they go, the further the outside world drops away. Somewhere a pipe is dripping. Evgeni can hear it, but he can’t place where. All he can smell is mould and mildew. The bunker is rotting from the inside out. It probably floods in spring, when the snow melts. It stands like an act of blunt force. Nothing short of one of the missiles it once held would be enough to wipe it from the landscape, but neglect will probably be enough to bury it one day. Neglect buries most things.

Sentiment doesn’t count for much outside of Moscow.

“Watch your step,” they are told by the guard leading them.

The tunnels are haphazardly lit. The Traktor were’s put the bunker back on the grid for the traders, but that was all they did. Some temporary lights have been rigged up near the defunct telecommunications centre. It’s a wide, hall of a room. Once it would have been a hive of activity. Now much of the original technology is gone. Gutted. Only unconnected wires and leads are left. Most are snarled and tangled. The copper wires have long since been harvested. In their place, a few laptops have been step up; a satellite phone is charging off one of them.

“They it?” one of the traders asks.

Running his eyes over Evgeni and Plotnikov, he visibly appears to work out their value within moments. His gaze lingers predictably, noting the wear of their clothes and the strength in their frames.

“They’ll do,” he says.

Another trader scoffs. “We’re not paying the dogs enough? Now we have to have them on site?”

Evgeni bites back on a growl.

The trader who had vetted them, turns back to his glowing laptop screen. “Give them an inch…”

And that is that.

That is all it takes.

 

 

For the first few days, he and Plotnikov split their time between day and night shifts.

The trader’s security is a motley mix of humans and supernatural. No other weres, but a ragged looking vampire and a few hybrids. Hired muscle brought out from the other side of the Ural Mountains. Their accents give that away. Some are more professional than others. None are particularly interested in guarding a freezing bunker or the trader’s stock contained within it. If they are curious about what exactly they are hired to guard, they are experienced enough not to show it.

At night, Evgeni patrols the perimeter of the base with the vampire.

The vampire is old, maybe a few decades off a century. It shows. His skin is paper thin, and his teeth are chipped. Maybe in his past life he was a soldier. Maybe just a mercenary. Evgeni couldn’t say which. He holds himself in a way that could reflect either. On the occasions they speak, they talk of the cold. The coming winter will be harsh. Vampires do not feel the cold. Unspoken, is the knowledge that their prey does.

Were’s are not prey. Yet Evgeni is glad when he clocks off.

The days, according to Plotnikov, are different. Busier, in some ways. Less in others.

During daylight hours the traders go to the surface and make calls, contacting middle men. From what Plotnikov has overheard, they seem to be forgoing an auction and focusing on organising visits from prospective buyers. Though they are fixed about the price they want, they are keen to move on as quickly as they can.

From the other guards, Plotnikov learns they are all hired short term contracts.

“They were only meant to be here a fortnight,” Plotnikov says.

A few have already returned to the capital.

“Do they know when the traders will leave?”

Plotnikov shakes his head. “None of them know how much longer they will be here. None of them want to stay much longer.”

There is a thread of anxiety and paranoia about the guards. Evgeni sees it reflected in the edges and angles of them at night when they start drinking.

No one comes into were territory unless they are stupid, or desperate.

On the surface, Empress Elizaveta gift of territory in the 1700s after the Seven Year War was a neat “out of sight, out of mind” solution to the ‘wolf problem’. However despite her efforts and renewed determination in the early 1900s, hundreds of small, familial packs couldn’t be sent – banished– to the corners of the Russian empire, live cheek and jowl together without conflict. They just couldn’t. Instinct can’t be frozen out. They can’t be rewritten or modernised either. Assimilation was never going to happen.

Today, what peace there is between packs is uneasy. Yet all packs are unified when it comes to traders. For traders and mercenaries to dare to come to into their territory speaks volumes. Both about them, and about what they had hidden away deep in the depth of the bunker.

At night Evgeni listens to arguments.

No one wants to go near whatever it is they have.

“It’s awake now,” one trader says.

“It doesn’t have to be,” another says.

There is a flare and Evgeni smells something burnt. This place was built to handle magic. But it was built decades ago. The walls are cold and the florescent lights always seem to flicker. The lifts are dead so everyone is forced to use the stairs. The lighting doesn’t work any better in the confined space, even with pale coloured tiles on the wall for it to bounce off. There is poison here. It doesn’t – can’t – touch Evgeni, but he recognises it.

“This is what happens,” Plotnikov tells. “This is what always happens.”

And this is what the traders bargained with the Traktor pack leaders to use.

“They have no idea,” Evgeni says.

“None.”

 

 

(As of yet, neither them are sure what exactly the traders have, but they have something.

Someone.)

 

 

The possibility of the Lost Fae being in Russia, a world away from the front lines of the war effort, doesn’t feel real to Evgeni. However the rumours of him disappearing in the midst of battle didn’t seem real either. When they first started cropping up on the wire services it sounded like a hoax. It still does, if Evgeni is honest. 

Fae don’t disappear.

They just don’t.

They leave great battles victorious and take up a seat at a high fae court amidst great fanfare and next to no care about the aftermath they leave in their wake. That is what they do. That is what they always have done. They most certainly don’t get caught by traders, and certainly not by amateurs.

 

 

The traders are not running a particularly sophisticated operation. None of them seem particularly within their comfort zone. They keep close to the laptops and often are on their phones. Evgeni doubts they’ve ever stepped foot outside Moscow before. They are mid-level at the most. New to it, but not so new that they don’t have some money and a few contacts. This, Evgeni knows from experience, is important. Word of mouth is a powerful thing.

None of the traders seem particularly violent, but they are indifferent in a way that repulses Evgeni.

“It’s in good condition,” Evgeni overhears them saying.

And;

“No, weren’t not giving any discounts or accepting future favours. The price is non-negotiable.”

Equally, it quickly becomes apparent that the traders are over confident – careless really in how freely they speak and how much they say.

Names, dates, figures, magics and curses – all slip through their lips like they are worth nothing.

Plotnikov recognises some.

“We have some time,” he says slowly. “Some leeway too.”

Evgeni nods. He had figured as much. Even if they know the way into and through the Ural Mountains, it will take any buyers or, more probably, middle men maybe a fortnight or longer to arrive. That is time Evgeni and Plotnikov can use to plan. Time they should use to plan. Evgeni exhales slowly – he needs to remember that, he knows he does.

“We can’t act rashly,” Plotnikov says.

Evgeni trusts Plotnikov. Perhaps more than anyone. He makes himself nod. Nod and go back into work the next day.

For the most part the traders’ failing are greeted with disinterested. None of the other guards are particularly interested in their work. They might be good at it, but they are in the middle of nowhere doing a relatively straightforward job. As such it isn’t particularly difficult for Evgeni to follow Plotnikov’s lead and insinuate himself into the day to day routine on the base.

People can be predictable. Traders especially so. At least that is what Plotnikov tells Evgeni.

He has done this before. In the stillness and inactivity of each shift, they gather intel. Together they familiarise themselves with the traders’ movements and moods. They learn the guards’ habits and memorise their rotations. During the day, Plotnikov studies the old wards sunk into the ground, and at night Evgeni covertly tests which defensive lines still hold. It’s a waiting game for the most part.

“We can’t go in guns blazing,” Plotnikov says.

Evgeni nods.

As much as he wants to, he knows they can’t use force to rescue the fae. There is a reason no one is expecting outside or internal interference. The Traktor pack is well paid for this acquiescence and Moscow officials are far, far away. The bunker itself is the biggest hurdle. All military standard infrastructure is designed to withstand magic. Yet this bunker was specifically designed to store and launch missiles. It’s one of the few places that could hold a fae. The walls are made of thick Magnitogorsk steel that could be anywhere from 15 to 30cm thick. Behind that is at least triple the depth of reinforced concrete.”

It is Maria who finds the original schematics of the bunker.

“I don’t know how accurate any of these are,” she says, unrolling the plans from the water stained cardboard tube before they have dinner.

Evgeni understands when he looks closely at them. Some of the details are off. There are multiple revised versions of the bunker.

Maria nods, when they point them out.

With a careful hand, she annotates the most recent blueprint. Her cursive is neat and orderly.

It doesn’t take the three of them long come to the same conclusion.

“The control room,” Maria says.

Evgeni had suspected as much for a while.

Taking a sip of tea, Plotnikov’s free hand smooths out the centre of the map where the room lies. In the very heart of the bunker, it’s the most secure part of the entire structure. The patchy records indicate additional layers of steel and concrete. Once it was where officers kept watch on radars twenty four hours a day, poised for action. The perfectly circular room was designed to keep the world out if under attack– and now it’s the most likely holding cell for someone as powerful as a fae.

“Almost impossible to get to and to get the fae out of…” Evgeni says, trailing off.

“Yeah,” Plotnikov says.

Fae’s can’t be kept, Alex said that. That’s the old wives tale. But they aren’t fae. They’re wolves. Evgeni isn’t sure where that leaves them.

“You don’t need to get in,” Maria says. “You just need the traders to unlock the door for you.”

Evgeni looks at her. There is something determined in her eyes.

“The auction,” she says and Evgeni nods. “Buyers will want to see him.”

The traders will open the doors for that, for them. They’ll probably have to move the fae to a more central location too. Money can’t melt snow and black ice off Siberian roads in winter.

Plotnikov shakes his head. “We don’t need to wait for that.”

The oven timer goes off.

“Everyone has to eat,” Plotnikov says. “Even a fae.”

 

 

There were old stories, myths about leaving milk and honey, witches thimbles and bread. Others about air and magic and iron. But there are stories about everything.

“That’s what happens,” Maria says.

Evgeni thinks she’s right.

There are stories about wolves too. Some are even true. One in particular has a certain kind of currency with the traders. Evgeni may have outgrown being an exotic pet, but he is well aware that a werewolf’s pelt still has a certain cache.

Evgeni is good with people. Good at getting what he wants. The risks might be high, but it’s not exactly hard. A few comments, a few key words. It doesn’t take much.

“Wolves and magic,” one of the traders says, like it’s their idea.

And then he and Plotnikov are in charge of feeding the fae.

“It’s not like they’ll get hurt if it tries anything,” another trader agrees.

 

 

“Is it–?” Evgeni asks, when Plotnikov finishes his shift.

Plotnikov shrugs. “I don’t know. Maybe? But maybe not.”

And at first glance, Evgeni isn’t sure what the creature is either. It’s hard to tell.

The traders make it all into such a production. It is a procession to the control room, led by armoured guards. The formation they fall into feels like a surreal echo of Evgeni’s memories of being a fresh recruit practicing drills and formations until they became muscle memory. It’s what he falls back onto now. When they reach the heart of the bunker, he steps forward like clockwork as the guards take position behind him. At the very rear, two of the traders watch on. They’ve put on their Kevlar. The material smells of sweat.

The fluorescent lighting flickers when Evgeni touches the control room door. It looks at least as impenetrable as the walls. Constructed of steel, its counter sunk into the frame around it. At the back of Evgeni’s mind, he remembers Plotnikov swearing when Maria told them about it. A blast wave – either of magic or any other kind of destructive force – wouldn’t be able to lift it. Next to the reinforced door frame is a gutted security system. What’s left of it hangs from the wall. What remains in service are the physical locks and deadbolts that groan as he unlocks them.

The lighting inside the control room is unreliable. It flickers on as Evgeni pulls the heavy door open a few centimetres. The harshness of the florescent lighting washes everything out. At first glance –

It – _he_ \- is bruised up.

Black and blue, and huddled in the back corner of the cell, he doesn’t move when Evgeni places the tray of food on the concrete floor.

Evgeni – he wants to do more.

He must hesitate, because behind him he hears a gun safety switch being flicked off.

Evgeni can’t act rashly. Not now.

So he steps out of the control room and shuts the door. The guards – the hybrids and the humans – push him aside immediately to lock everything down again.

 

 

It is a long twenty four hours until Evgeni is allowed to see the fae again.

 

 

Over the next few days, Evgeni follows Plotnikov’s lead; they both move with easy, careless confidence when it comes time to take meals to the control room. They smile widely and they joke. It doesn’t take too long for the level of risk to be downgraded in everyone’s minds; both the guards and the traders. From a full force of armed back up, Evgeni soon is taking meals to the control room with just one or two disinterested guard watching his back.

Sometimes, Evgeni manages to linger, just a little. Sometimes he leaves the lights on in the control room and through the thick glass periscope window, he watches the fae.

Each night he slowly and carefully hobbles to the plates of food Evgeni leaves. Often though, he picks at the offering. It worries Evgeni. Everything worries Evgeni. Traders, even ones new to the business, tend to be reasonably careful with stock. The creature, whatever he is – whoever he is – is unwell, and he is getting worse. Everyone can see it. He hardly ever moves. When he does, he moves stiffly as if he is hurt badly. He smells of it. Smells of dried blood and shit and sickness which clings to him like tar. Smells of marrow, of cracked ribs and sleep deprivation; it’s sour on Evgeni’s tongue.

He remembers what Alex said; the thing about fae is that they can't be kept. Nothing can hold them if they don't want to be held. However the traders have him locked away in a steel cage and he's hurt and Evgeni thinks there must be a difference between stories and the truth. Or maybe there is just a difference between rumours and the truth.

“He’s not getting better,” Evgeni tells Maria.

It’s daytime and Evgeni should be sleeping. He should be asleep after getting off an eight hour shift. Yet he can’t.

It’s been about a week since they started pocketing the mixed cocktail of sedatives they were meant to spike his food with. Yet it hasn’t altered anything; his eyes are still glazed and he seems weaker than he did before.

Sitting in his friends warm home, Evgeni has the bunker plans spread out over the carpet. Every spare moment has been devoted to studying them. They’re burned into his memory. By the heater, two of the pups are snoozing peacefully in their wicker bassinet. They are so young. All puppy fluff and long whiskers. Something in Evgeni’s heart aches. He closes his eyes.

“We’re almost there,” Maria says. 

Sitting by the window, the muted sunlight falls over her shoulders. A velvet jewellery roll is laid out next to her. Instead of jewels it’s filled with delicate tools and fine pens. On tiny pieces of rice paper she has been crafting traceless notes. It’s complex work. Someone like Alex would find it easy. It would be simple for him to create beautiful pieces of magic; notes which would dissolve into ashes once read, or become unreadable if the wrong person found them. They can’t do that. Were’s might be immune to magic, but they can’t use it.

There are only three of them. They can’t use force; they can’t come in guns blazing. Their plan relies on stealth and speed instead.

But the clock is ticking.

It’s only a matter of time before buyers will their way through the mountains.  When they come, the fae will change hands. Once that happens he will quickly disappear into the private market. Given his deteriorating condition, it’s clear that the traders are pushing for that to happen sooner or later.

“I don’t think there is going to be an auction,” Evgeni says.

The more he thinks about it, the more he is convinced there isn’t going to be one.

Maria nods. “At least not a traditional one.”

Alex might hear whispers from all corners and districts of Russia, but he isn’t here and he hasn’t seen what they have. 

“It’ll be a private sale,” she says, setting her magnifying glass down.

A private sale, in this case, will mean up selling to an upper level trader. Or to a certain kind of private buyer. Evgeni isn’t particularly keen to meet either. Although the traders here are inexperienced and the guards unmotivated, the people being sent encoded calling cards aren’t the sort of people to travel light. Equally they aren’t the kind of people who give up easily when their quarry escapes.

The reality of it isn’t new. Evgeni knows this. He isn’t a child.

He thinks of his mother and the stories she had told him and his brother, warning them of the danger of wandering too far from the pack. It idea of being taken had seemed outlandish as a child; but it was easy being fearless when he knew nothing of traders and buyers.

Honestly, what the creature is doesn’t matter. Evgeni doesn’t care if he is a fae, a nymph, a Charis or what. Alex must have known this. Why else would he have sent Evgeni? Alex is the brightest star to mark the sky since his mother won the last great battle of Europe. He could have asked anyone, but instead he asked Evgeni and it might be the actions of a naïve child, but he’s not leaving the creature in that cage with people planning to sell him to the highest bidder.

“We’re not going to,” she promises, her voice calm.

There are only three of them, but they are strong and they are clever.

They still have a little time and it’s on their side. Together they finalise their plan. 

Over the following days Evgeni and Plotnikov take turns sneaking tiny notes into the control room under stale pieces of bread and vinegary canned vegetables. Yet none seem to elicit a response.

At night, when Evgeni makes sure his patrol passes the control room, he manages fleeting glances at the fae – at him – through the thick glass porthole window. He could be Sidney Crosby. But he could be any unfortunate creature.

The files said Prince Sidney Crosby. It’s been awhile since Evgeni last saw them, but he knew about Sidney before he saw the files. Everyone had heard of him. Even in Russia people know him. Not just a fae, but the New World’s Changeling. The second coming of King Gretzky, the first of his name.

The files said he fell. That he was lost in the midst of battle.

Evgeni can’t be sure, but he thinks he maybe could actually be a fae. Which doesn't make sense at all. 

Clothed in the remnants of pale blue, dirty yellow and black, his pupils are blown and his skin is grey and tissue paper translucent and he is shaking, always shaking whenever Evgeni looks at him out of the corner of his eyes. Yet even like that, there is something about the way the light hits his skin and the sharp bones of his knuckles, that lends itself to something fae. Or maybe just something Evgeni has never encountered.

Either way, Evgeni is getting him out.

 

 

When the traders start to hear from their contacts, Evgeni knows that their time is running out.

 

 

A buyer comes early.

No one knows how they do it. It’s dusk when she arrives with a detail of security behind her. They appear seamlessly out of the gloom, in matching SUV’s which seem to absorb the light. With pin neat hair and her finely boned hands held carefully by her side, she nods at one of the traders and greets another without wasting too many words. The formality is both useful and meaningless; but that perhaps to be expected of any kind of formality when money is involved. Neither side seems to mind, not when the traders lead them into the bunker and unlock the control room door.

“Up,” one of the trader orders.

The fae – Sidney – does not move.

Evgeni – Evgeni does not move. He wants to. He wants to overpower the traders and the moneyed buyer.

There is the sound of a switch being flicked and the air prickles against Evgeni’s skin. The trader has something that looks like a cattle prod in his hand. They are the one who steps forward. They move with a specific kind of confidence.

Relegated to the back of the room, behind the buyers looming security, Evgeni he watches as the trader makes the creature stand. His limbs unfold colt-like and unsteadily. Under the lights, his filthy undershirt hangs from his shoulders. The files didn’t have his exact birthdate, but Evgeni realises they must be around the same age.

“The Crown Prince,” the trader says. Or introduces.

The buyer makes a disinterested sound.

“So much royalty around,” she comments, stepping forward. “The Romanov name is so common nowadays.”

The trader’s expression twists.

“Gretzky née Crosby,” he corrects.

The buyer isn’t listening. She isn’t even looking at him. She is looking at the fae. Her eyes flick over him.

“Let me see it properly,” she says.

With his free hand, the trader grabs the fae’s chin and forces him to look at the buyer.

There is wildness in his eyes. Even from a distance Evgeni sees it and recognises it and –  the fae is weak, everyone can see that, but he bites the trader. Hard.

For a moment, there is chaos.

The trader swears and one of the other guards steps forward to backhand the creature. The fae falls.

Just as suddenly as it began, it is all over. The trader pulls a handkerchief from his pocket and wraps it around his bloodied hand.

“He has spirit.” 

The buyer nods.

They begin to talk about age and weight and colouring and ability.

The creature does not move.

Later Evgeni is told to clean him up. He is given some water, and instructions to check the creature’s teeth, jawline and nose. The guard didn’t pull back his punch. Stock can be disciplined but not damaged. Three other guards supervise. All make it clear that Evgeni pulled the short straw.

“Careful of your fingers,” one jokes as he switches on the power and unlocks the door.

Evgeni makes himself laugh and tries not to flinch when they lock the control room after he steps into it.

It’s just procedure. Nothing more. Yet the wolf in him rebels – the wolf in him does not understand why Evgeni would willingly put himself in a cage, even momentarily.

Curled up in the back far corner of the control room, they fae has yet to move. Carefully Evgeni kneels down and touches his shoulder. His skin is clammy. Above them, the fluorescent lights hum. Inside Evgeni’s chest, his heart thumps so loudly he thinks it echoes.

Neither of them should be here.

He opens his mouth. He wants to speak. He wants to say his name, but he can’t. His throat feels like a closed fist.

Up close Evgeni can see that although the fae’s face was bruised to begin with, for the most part it doesn’t seem like the hit or the subsequent fall did any lasting damage. With a towel, Evgeni wipes off the blood and grime. It isn’t much, but it will have to do for now.

It isn’t until he is clocking out at the end of his shift, his hands begin to shake.

“Fuck,” he swears. “Fuck.”

 

 

That night they decide to push the escape up.

“If one buyer saw him, more will be coming sooner than we thought,” Evgeni says. It’s true, but it is also a lie.

Plotnikov must know that, but he doesn’t say anything.

For the last few weeks, it has just been the two of them on the ground at the warehouse and in Plotnikov’s home making plans with Maria. Neither of them have spoken about it, but they has been careful not to bring his pack into the loop. They allowed the traders onto pack territory. According to one of Maria’s cousins, the traders promised a healthy cut of the profits – for that, the Traktor pack broke all the rules of lands.  

“I don’t trust them,” Plotnikov admits. “Not after this.”

Evgeni glances at him, but Plotnikov won’t meet his eyes.

Neither he or Maria have spoken to Evgeni about what would happen afterwards to them. Evgeni is afraid to ask.

“This is our home,” Maria says. “We’ll fight for it.”

Evgeni looks at her. He remembers Fanuza; bright and young. An up and comer in the Traktor pack. And Plotnikov – his name known in Moscow. No one knows Maria, but Evgeni thinks they will.

 

 

A pack is a pack is a pack. 

But a pack is nothing without wolves like Maria.

 

 

Originally they were going to wait until he was being transported; no one knows the roads like were’s do. With the hours of daylight growing ever shorter, the roads at night were becoming increasingly treacherous at night. Or they were for outsiders. Some black ice and the threat of other less friendly packs would be the blunt force needed for an escape. However with the timeline condensed, they have to rethink everything.

What happens next is an act of coordination. They three of them are wolves. The land they stand on is theirs in the ways that matter. Humans tend to forget that.

It is riskier to make their move in the midst of the increasingly paranoid traders and with buyers coming and going to and from the warehouse. However Evgeni and Plotnikov have been working at the base for weeks. In that time they have acquired or know where all the keys and passes are. They know where the blind spots in the camera surveillance are. They know the traders, and the hired guards. They know everyone’s different habits and quirks. They can predict them.

The plan is to break the fae out when the shift change occurs. There will be more people on the complex. However they’ll all be in-between leaving and arriving; the unique kind of limbo where people take their eyes off their tasks at hand, and others haven’t quite settled into work.

They both worry that the fae will slow them down. They are fast, but him? He is an unknown. Neither Evgeni nor Plotnikov know how to approach him, how to ready him for what it to come. In breaks between shifts, Evgeni tries to get his attention, angling his shoulders in the way of the camera and tapping his fingers on the porthole window. Trying again and again to form eye contact.

“Be ready,” Evgeni hisses at him.

The creature flinches, but does not look up.

When the day comes and they go to the control room to get him, he doesn’t understand what they are doing. Perhaps he even thinks they have come to take him to the sale yards.

“No,” he says. “No.”

And even Evgeni with his school room English can understand that.

“We help,” he tries. “It’s okay.”

The fae struggles, kicking and fighting dirty, but he is weak and between them they bundle him out of the warehouse and into their car.

It isn’t until the warehouse is miles behind them, that Evgeni breathes easy.

 

 

The end point of the plan if there ever truly was one, was to take the fae to Alex.

Plans change.

Alex might be the brightest star in Russia’s sky, he isn’t behind the wheel.  With the traders in their rear vision mirror, neither Evgeni nor Plotnikov comment that the direction they are driving is away from Alex, instead of towards him. Winter has arrived, almost overnight. Since Evgeni left Magnitogorsk, more roads have been closed or about to be. Even if they could make it to Moscow, they wouldn’t be able to make it back. Maybe they could have pushed it, but they head south rather than west, towards Magnitogorsk, to Evgeni’s pack. 

Magnitogorsk might not be the best place for a fae, but few places are.

Between the two of them, they take turns driving. They might have gotten away, but the more distance between them and the traders, the better. On the highway at the edge of Chelyabinsk, Maria meets them. Her eyes are dark when they pull over, and she briefly greets Plotnikov before turning to Evgeni.

“The pack is moving,” she tells them.

Unsaid, is how Evgeni needs to move too.

Outsiders may stray into pack territory, but it is harder to leave once the pack had their scent.

Though they managed to get the fae out of the bunker, if the traders or Traktor pack catch up with him, there is little hope that he alone could prevent them from taking the fae back. Safety feels like a ridiculous concept to entertain when Evgeni is still far from their pack lines. All he can do is keep driving. So he does. No one gets much sleep. Evgeni only stops when the fuel gage is low.

The fae doesn’t sleep either. It isn’t healthy. He isn’t healthy.

Although he is more lucid that he was at the warehouse, Evgeni doesn’t fool himself into thinking that he is trusted.

If he could bolt, Evgeni thinks he would.

He tries to escape the first time Evgeni stops for petrol. He doesn’t get anywhere; his legs give out on him. Evgeni gathers him up and locks him in the car. It isn’t what he wants to do, but he does not have the luxury of choice. Above him must be at least one camera, and behind them could be anything or anyone.

“It’s okay,” Evgeni tries to tell him, but it is no good.

He doesn’t trust Evgeni. Evgeni can’t blame him.

When Evgeni gets back to his car after paying, he accepts food and water from Evgeni but flinches the one time Evgeni tries to check him for injuries in the dimly lit petrol station bathroom. 

“We need to get you to a hospital,” Evgeni says.

The fae does not respond.

 

 

Evgeni still don’t know his name, but somewhere between the bunker and the hospital, he becomes Sidney.

Evgeni can’t call him ‘the fae’ or ‘the creature’ anymore. He just can’t. So Sidney it is.

 “You’re safe now,” Evgeni promises him. “We’re going to help you.”

Sidney doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t even look at Evgeni.

Evgeni can’t blame him.

 

 

Five hours into the drive, Sidney burns through the last of his adrenalin and starts to sleep fitfully, slipping in and out of consciousness.

Behind the wheel, Evgeni keeps his eyes on the road.

They’re almost there. Only an hour or two to go. Then – only then can there be time for ‘then’s’.

 

 

It’s a relief when they reach the outskirts of pack lines. Behind the wheel, Evgeni exhales and feels some of the tension he had carried with him ease.

They are home.

 

 

(Evgeni has to hold Sidney down when they get to the hospital.

The moment he realises where they are he begins to struggle and fight. Thrashing out, he is doing more harm than good to himself. Evgeni tries to tell him to stop, but his English is pitiful and Sidney is too far gone to listen.

Then a doctor injects him with something and down Sidney goes.)

 

 

 

 

**Magnitogorsk, Chelyabinsk Oblast, Russia.**

_I am that candle, who with my burning heart_

_Make a ruin glow;_

Forugh Farrokhzad, _The Captive_ , other Birth and Other Poems.

 

_There is an animal inside me, clutching fast to my heart;_

Anne Sexton, _The Poet of Ignorance._

 

 

Word always travels fast Magnitogorsk.

Word of an outsider travels faster.

Evgeni knows this and it doesn’t take long for the pack to respond. And the pack does respond. It takes all of Evgeni’s remaining strength to try to meet Sergei Fedorov’s eyes when he finds Evgeni sitting outside Sidney’s hospital room. However Evgeni can’t hold his gaze. As he flinches and looks away, Fedorov settles into the plastic seat next to Evgeni. In reality his strong shoulders and long limbs take up as much space as Evgeni’s, but it feels like he takes up far more. 

“Your brother lied for you,” Fedorov comments after a beat.

Evgeni exhales slowly. He didn’t know that but it doesn’t surprise him. “I didn’t ask him to.”

“He shouldn’t have had to.”

Evgeni nods.

He knows that.

“Who is he?” Fedorov asks. “Who did you bring into our territory?”

Evgeni shrugs. “I don’t know for sure.”

It isn’t a lie, because Evgeni isn’t a liar. However it’s close to one. They both are aware of that.

Fedorov is quiet. He is waiting. Patience is something he learnt through years of hard won experience and something they both know Evgeni still lacks.

Ducking his head a little, Evgeni feels something inside him twist and take shape.

“Maybe a fae,” Evgeni says; the words like hens teeth. “Maybe just someone unlucky to be caught by traders.”

Fedorov’s breathing alters. “Traders?”

“They didn’t follow us here. They couldn’t.”

Outside, a snow storm is raging. In a week, the city will probably be closed. In a month; the entire district will be.

Evgeni bites his lip. “I promised him that he would be safe here.”

Fedorov looks at Evgeni. His gaze is direct and Evgeni manages to meet it after a moment or two. He is a good Alpha – Evgeni knows this. The entire pack knows this. They are lucky to have him.

“Zhenya,” Fedorov says finally. “You can’t make that promise.”

“You can,” Evgeni says. Begs, maybe.

And Fedorov can. Yet that doesn’t mean he will.

“For now, he may stay,” Fedorov allows.

 

 

(It is as close to a reprimand as Zhenya receives from him.)

 

 

Magnitogorsk was one of the first Imperial outposts Empress Elizaveta ordered to be built in Siberia. Whatever vision she or her advisors once had has more or less faded over the years. What remains is a shadow of the original city layout. Most has either been repurposed or is a dilapidated shadow of what it once was. The hospital perhaps is an exception. Like much of the original city, it used to be military and there is still a military feel to the way it runs.

From his seat in the corridor Evgeni watches the medical staff move in a synchronization of their own. Most of the hospital staff is were. All are pack. Between pm and am, there is a shift change. However the staff who should be clocking off the end of their night shift wait at the nurses’ station to speak to Fedorov. They glance at Evgeni when he accompanies Fedorov and ask again, if there is anything further than Evgeni can tell them. He wishes there was. The scant details he knows about Sidney don’t amount to much.

Sensing Evgeni’s frustration, Fedorov lays a comforting hand on his shoulder and turns to the medical team.

“What can you tell us?” he asks.

Not much, it turns out.

Politely they refuse to go into details about Sidney’s condition.

“Doctor/Patient confidentiality,” one explains needlessly.

What they mean is they operate on a need to know policy.

With anyone else, this might hold water. However it’s different with Fedorov. The city is his responsibility. There isn’t anything he doesn’t need to know, especially come winter.

When they pull out Sidney’s incomplete charts for him, his eyes don’t linger over anything personal. 

“No trackers or curses?” he asks, glancing up.

“None.”

“Fae?”

“It’s hard to tell.”

They ran blood tests. They took x-rays. They know the extent of Sidney’s injuries. They are able to draw conclusions. They all know that. 

Fedorov closes the chart and hands it back over.  “I trust you will keep me updated.”

 

 

It’s a matter of time, they say.

Time and luck.

(Most things are).

 

 

When it happens, it happens in disjointed parts.

The sound of a heart monitor.

An exhaled breath.

It happens without Sidney noticing.

With senses numb, he drifts in and out of consciousness. Hours slip through his fingers. Maybe days. He can’t keep track of anything. Every part of his body aches, and his head pounds. Moving makes him dizzy. The buzzing glow of florescent lights make him nauseous. People come and go. They wake him up and they touch him and shine pen lights into his eye. Needles and blood and soft voices.

The heart monitor increases. Sidney’s heart rate increases. Sidney struggles but doesn’t get anywhere. Sedated, his limbs are heavy and sluggish and they don’t respond quickly. What magic he has, hurts, when he reaches for it. Like a splinter under the quick of a nail. He presses anyway. He was taught to. Nothing comes of it – nothing good anyway.

Not many people speaks to him in English, but they do say his name. He doesn’t know how they got it. All he knows is they have it and they say it like it is known – like it was freely given to them.

It wasn’t. He would never.

He – he isn’t sure.

Maybe he’s free. He isn’t sure about that either.

There is a tight clutch of fear in Sidney. Fear and hope; knotted tight and painfully in his throat. There are no locks on his door. There are no restraints on him either. Not magical or physical. So maybe he was rescued. Maybe. He isn’t home – he isn’t safe, but he isn’t encased in steel. Just a hospital room. A hospital room that could be anywhere. Wherever he is, he knows he has to get back home; he knows he needs to get back. But he has no idea how.

There are guards on his door. He can see shadows move under his door every few hours when they swap over. Sometimes he sees the guard who wasn’t really a guard; the one with the soft voice. His comes inside Sidney’s room and folds himself into the plastic chair by the bed. All long lines and soft eyes, he is a quiet presence.

Sidney has been trained for a lot of things, but not so much for this.

The guard who wasn’t a guard – the werewolf – says something, maybe his name and gestures to himself.

Stupid and groggy, Sidney attempts to say it, but he must pronounce it wrong.

The guard who wasn’t a guard shakes his head.

“Evgeni,” he repeats.

Sometime later he’s still there but he’s sitting closer and his long fingers are laced together.

“Zhenya,” he says, or maybe he says something else. Sidney doesn’t quite catch it either.

He shushes him when Sidney struggles to sit up. He has kind eyes. Gentle hands too. It’s confusing.

Sidney has to close his eyes. It’s too much. Sometimes when he opens them Evgeni or Zhenya or whoever he is, is there. Sometimes he isn’t. Sidney drifts. No matter how much he tries he can’t seem to hold onto anything. Time feels like it is looping around him. Battlefields, blood and cages and now this – now white sheets and linoleum floors and the sharp scent of bleach. A hospital room. That isn’t much to go on. All hospitals look the same.

He could be anywhere.

There had been Cyrillic labels in the cell, but there was no context. Here in the hospital there is the language people speak, labels on the juice he is given for breakfast and the notes on his medical chart. It looks like he is somewhere in Russia, Sidney thinks, where exactly, he has no idea. But somewhere in Russia – which should be impossible. The ley lines are closed. It’s been nearly a year since the New World had any contact with the Old.

Yet here he is.

His ribs ache with each breath. His heart, his heart, raw nerves, the shattered parts of him...

Here he is.

There are how’s and there are why’s. Or there should be. Maybe there would be, if he could think clearly.

Deep in Sidney’s bones, instincts stir and push him to action.

If he came through the ley lines then there must be a way back. All he needs to do is to find it.

It isn’t easy. The hospital is filled with weres. Yet despite the fact it’s seemingly part of a military base, no one holds themselves like officers or grunts. They feel like a pack to Sidney, but nothing like the packs he’s known before. The Alpha is easy to identify. Something about him looks familiar, but Sidney can’t figure out what. The Alpha moves with measured authority and innate confidence. However his pack isn’t just the circle of interchangeable weres who follow in his wake. It feels like everyone is; the staff, the other patients, the orderlies and the visitors.

It’s strange and at odds with the surroundings. Sidney isn’t sure what to make of it.

Between check up’s and sleeping, he watches the rotations and tries to make sense of things. The medical team treats him with a care that feels careful. Probably with humans back home he could catch them off guard, but not here. Weres see everything, hear everything. They don’t need any of the machines he is attached to in order to hear his heartbeat, pulse or breathing rate alter. Sidney doesn’t fool himself into thinking otherwise.

The Alpha often checks in with him and with the weres’ who guard his room. Some become regulars Sidney starts to recognise. And there is Evgeni, who becomes familiar in his own way. Sometimes he brings weres with him. They seem like his family to Sidney. They are his pack; that is unquestionable.

 

 

(Sidney bides his time).

 

 

Evgeni isn’t naïve. Magnitogorsk is in his blood and his heart. It is his home, but it isn’t the best place for Sidney. The nights are long and dangerous for someone who isn’t pack and doesn’t understand how their pack works. That would be enough to worry anyone, but then within days of arrival Sidney starts trying to escape. He still hasn’t said a word, won't willingly look at them – though things like that turn out to be null and void because once he has recovered enough to stand, he's gone. The first attempts are clumsy. Hell, he can barely walk, but whenever he’s left alone for too long, he unplugs his IV and is stealing clothes and making a break for it. What’s worse is every time he does, he gets a little further than he did the previous time.

At first it’s halfway down the hall. Next time a nurse finds him in an elevator.

The third time Evgeni receives a panicked call. When he and his brother Denis arrive, the hospital is in an uproar.

“We checked in on him during rounds,” he overhears an upset nurse tells the head doctor. “He was there then.”

Evgeni doesn’t doubt that, but clearly Sidney isn’t in his room now.

Working together, he and a handful of his pack mates try to trace Sidney’s steps, but it’s a difficult task. Tracking scents isn’t easy in a hospital. The bleach burns Evgeni’s nostrils when he inhales it. He knows Sidney’s scent, but the hospital is a mix of too many people’s scents layered over and over each other, and areas of stark sterilisation that are dead ends. There is security footage of Sidney, but it’s fractured; snatches of dark hair and sallow skin, and then ambiguous or blank sections where he must have begun to take notice of the cameras locations and started hiding from them with uncanny ease.

“Do you think he got outside?” Denis asks.

Evgeni hopes he didn’t. It’s late and dark and Sidney is still so weak. Medical reports might be private, but Sidney is an assumed ward of the pack and Evgeni’s responsibility. Evgeni’s seen the charts – but he remembers Sidney trying to escape at the petrol station on the drive to Magnitogorsk. He could barely move then, but there were scratch marks on the door handles when Evgeni got back into his car after paying for his tank full of petrol.

Evgeni nods. “Yes. I think so.”

Denis looks out the lobby doors into the night.

Winter is for wolves. Not for a fae.

“Shall we go out and look for him?” Denis asks. Behind them, their pack mates are talking about searching the underground hospital car park.

Evgeni nods.

Better sooner than later.

Outside, the streets are dark and empty.

Sidney is smart, Evgeni might think if Sidney wasn’t so stupid.

In the distance he hears sirens. Police. Magnitogorsk’s red light district living up to its name.

The roads are covered in black ice; Evgeni feels it under his paws when he shifts.

It is clearer outside. Even with snow falling and covering what hints that could lead them to Sidney. When they get about a hundred or so meters from the hospital, they all split up. They know Magnitogorsk. Apart they cover more ground. It is better that way. Around him, Evgeni hears the sound of the city. Empty streets don’t always mean quiet nights. Not here. Around him, the shadows stretch.

For a block, he follows the main road, but instincts have him slips off it and into side streets and alleys. He skirts around corners and down deeper into the city where the press of the buildings, the smell of red bricks and concrete are familiar.

It is like that he finds Sidney.

Dressed in a mix of stolen scrubs and street clothes, Evgeni finds him walking along the curb of the street near the river with one arm stretched out by his side. Ungloved, his bare fingers are already pink and raw looking. He’s doing something, but Evgeni does not know what. He twitches his ears and nose and –

There are stories… but there are stories about everything.

From a distance he watches Sidney walk slowly, one deliberate step at a time, each exhaled breath frosted, and from a distance Evgeni follows. Carefully, he edges closer and closer. Shoulders low and steps light, he moves in shadows and blinds spots until he is close enough to leap on Sidney, close enough to push him down and pin him to the ground. Yet this close to him, Evgeni can see the shift of Sidney’s shoulders, the way he holds himself and that’s instinctual too.

Evgeni lets out a soft sound, a whine.

Sidney stiffens.

Flight or fight, Evgeni thinks. Which will it be?

He isn’t Alex. There is no extensive education or specialised training behind him to provide clever guesses and flippant answers. Neither is he Sasha. He can’t see the future. He only has instinct to guide him. All he knows is the way Sidney held himself when the traders had him, and how he trembled when he thought no one would notice. Evgeni noticed. Evgeni notices how sometimes Sidney still shakes – how sometimes he is unsteady on his feet. He is unsteady now.

A few meters distance separates them. Evgeni looks at Sidney and Sidney meets his gaze. Under the streetlights, his hazel eyes are more green than anything else.

Flight or fight.

Evgeni can wait for Sidney to decide.

But in the end, Sidney doesn’t choose either.

Halting in place, he lets Evgeni comes close. Each step Evgeni takes feels fraught. Tension knots Sidney’s body and for a moment it feels explosive.

Evgeni stops mid-step.

His heart beats and he thinks he wouldn’t blame Sidney. He wouldn’t blame him at all. Then Sidney blinks and something in the air shifts. Something in both of them shifts to.

Evgeni moves close and Sidney doesn’t fuss when Evgeni herds him back in the direction of the warmth of the hospital. Together they walk side by side. Their strides match in a way Evgeni instinctually respond to. He likes it. He likes too, how effortlessly Sidney seems to predict Evgeni. It doesn’t take them long for Evgeni to no longer need to press his nose into Sidney’s side when they need to turn or for Sidney to stop pausing when Evgeni leads him a way he is unfamiliar with.

When they get back to the hospital, Evgeni nudges him up to his room where Sidney guiltily changes out of his stolen clothes. They have maybe a few moments alone until the nurses and doctors descend on them, redressing Sidney’s wounds and reattaching his IV before they let him settles back against the starched sheets.

Taking watch by the door, Evgeni stays with Sidney until he succumbs to sleep. He waits and watches as Sidney fuss with his blankets and pillows. Slowly he sees the colour come back to Sidney’s cheeks as he warms up, and he stays to see Sidney drift off to sleep, blinking slowly as his exhaustion catches up with him. Something deep inside Evgeni hurts. Part of Evgeni feels like he is still by the river bank, caught between moments. He is quiet when he pads out of the room. 

Down the hall in the staff change room, Evgeni shifts and gets dressed in his clothes that the orderlies had fetched from the lobby. One of them folded them neatly. It is a small kindness. When his brother and a scattering of pack mates join him, Evgeni rubs a towel through his damp hair. It’s wet from the melted snow and it’s drying in a knotted mess thanks to the hospitals heating.

“Is he okay?” Denis asks as he pulls on his jeans.

Evgeni nods. “Yeah. But he’s still stupid.”

 

 

That is the first time that Sidney manages to escape the hospital.

 It isn’t the last.

After a while Fedorov stops sending wolves after Sidney.

No one can make him stop. They can’t win against instincts buried that deep in someone or the decade of training which have refined them. For a week or so Evgeni and his pack mates trade watch duty outside his room, but Sidney goes where he wants. He slips out when they are answering a phone call or when their attention is captured by the sound of the nursing staff laughing at something or another. No matter their level of alertness or experience, he has a way of picking his moments. Following him is equally as futile. Once unplugged and out of sight, it’s almost impossible to keep track of him. The further away he gets from his room, the harder it is to return him to it.

Maybe Evgeni doesn’t have much patience, but he is determined. That makes up for many faults, and it’s something that stands him in good stead with Sidney. In wolf form, Evgeni tracks him. Following his scent and keeping an ear out for the now familiar beat of his heart, Evgeni finds him. Sometimes, after he’s tracked Sidney down, Evgeni will follow him at a distance. Sometimes Sidney knows he’s there, sometimes he doesn’t. Either way, he acts the same.

Tonight is no different.

This time Sidney slipped out of the ward when a patient is being moved between units. In stolen street clothes, he moves like he is looking for something.  From a safe distance, Evgeni follows. There is no exact pattern to the paths Sidney’s escape attempts. Usually he ends up somewhere near the Ural River, but given that it runs through the heart of Magnitogorsk, that isn’t saying much.

Together, they walk through one block, and then two. Sidney doesn’t seem to have a plan. His footsteps aren’t light, but the heavy snow soon covers them. Maybe Evgeni should stop him, but he waits until Sidney gives up, exhausted with his shoulders slumped. Sometimes, when Sidney is feeling particularly stubborn he will ignore Evgeni and his own body, and keep walking out in night air. Those times he will only stop when Evgeni makes him, physically blocking Sidney’s path.

Tonight Sidney sighs, coming to a halt by the river. The edges are just beginning to freeze. The contrast between the white snow banks and the blackness of the deep and wide water is unforgiving. Everything is still around them.

The gridded layout of Magnitogorsk is easy to navigate even for outsiders. Sidney must learn parts of it during his escapes, yet the more Evgeni watches him the more he thinks Sidney isn’t trying to get out of the city. Rather than going for one of the cars in the hospital parking lot he moves on foot. Making his way off the main streets and into the shadows of the smaller side streets, the icy wind off the river knots Sidney’s hair and leaves his cheeks flushed. With an outstretched arm, his fingers look a little raw as the reach for something unseen. Yet there isn’t anything in the air. Evgeni can’t smell even a hint magic, but it feels like Sidney is doing something.

“Okay,” he mutters maybe to himself or maybe to Evgeni.

Under the streetlights, he looks young and soft and Evgeni must make a soft sound without realising it because Sidney turns to look at him.

The weight of Sidney’s gaze, takes Evgeni aback.

Sidney hasn’t looked at him before, Evgeni realises later when he’s on his way home. Sidney hasn’t looked at anyone. Not without a mountain of medicine running through his veins. Even now, he looks past people. Yet by the river, in the snow and ice he had looked at Evgeni. Though his gaze was impossible to read, his heart rate was steady and strong. It had not altered, not even when he let Evgeni step close and press his wet noses in the hollow at the back of his knees.

 

 

(Evgeni doesn’t mind tracking Sidney down night after night.)

 

 

Over the years Sidney has been a stranger to a lot of places and people.

Without the trappings of war he doesn’t know how to mark time. Time is difficult. Sleep is difficult. Sometimes it’s harder to breathe than it should be.

The ward heating isn’t great.

Sometimes orderlies bring around extra blankets. There smell like everything else does; a bit like bleach and a bit musty like the industrial dryer they were put in hasn’t been cleaned recently. By itself Sidney hardly notices the difference. Three or more feel heavy on Sidney’s body and sometimes he thinks that helps. It’s like they hold him in place and stop his mind from drifting. Sometimes it almost feels like they could be comforting.

Evgeni hands smooth the wrinkles out of them when he visits.

He doesn’t keep his distance anymore. Sitting by Sidney’s bedside with his long legs stretched out, he makes himself comfortable. Sometimes he brings chocolates with him. Sometimes he brings tea. Whenever he does it’s always hot and sweet. Steam rises from the ceramic mugs, curling into the air. At first Evgeni tries to ask Sidney how he likes it using gestures and speaking slowly in a mix of English and Russian. Back when Evgeni and the other not-guard were driving away from the dealers, they spoke to him slowly.

Sidney’s never been great with languages, but he can make do. Over the years he’s picked up a little of everything. Mostly from the stubborn veterans who knew English but wouldn’t use it around him or used it to his face thinking he wouldn’t understand. He tries to make do now. Russian sounds a little similar to Czech to his uneducated ears. Both are languages Sidney is accustomed to hearing especially when he was sent to undertake some advanced offensive off-the-books training.  

Inside Sidney, he feels the sharp edges press and pinch as he breathes. It hurt more before. Maybe it will hurt less later. He doesn’t know. He isn’t sure anyone does. No one in Pittsburgh did.

Sidney can’t think too much about Pittsburgh.

All he knows is he has to get back. All he knows - all the things Sidney doesn’t want to think about keep piling up on top of each other. It’s dizzying. At night they sneak into his dreams. Maybe he isn’t strong like he once was. He used to be able to run on fumes for weeks at a time. No sleep, headaches and high alert; standard practice. Now it’s like every hour that Sidney didn’t sleep is catching up on him. It’s –

Sometimes when doors close, he thinks he hears locks.

Sometimes when they open, he forgets where he is and expects to inhale the caustic dregs of burnt out magic.

Sometimes he thinks he catches the smell of steel and smelting metal on people’s clothes and their skin. Yet he can’t. He knows it isn’t that.

It just takes him a second. Just a second.

 

 

(Sometimes he thinks he wakes up covered in blood, but it’s just a cold sweat.)

 

 

Evgeni doesn’t know what to think about Sidney.

Over time he takes to sitting by his door whether or not Sidney tries to escape and it is Evgeni who sees Sidney when sleep makes him soft and unguarded.

Evgeni isn’t a young wolf.  He doesn’t fool himself into thinking Sidney trusts him.

Nevertheless, they have become used to each other. Evgeni tries. He waits and he tries not to push. Some things can’t be rushed. Sidney hasn’t really said anything, but over time his eyes have softened, and now the tension in his shoulders relaxes when Evgeni is around. 

It’s a while before Sidney is moved out of intensive care. The more time Evgeni spends with Sidney, the more it becomes obvious that he is a fish out of water. Lately he’s started to talk a little every now and then. Yes’ and no’s. Not much else – and afterwards he retreats into himself. He is a soldier, Evgeni sees it. Captured soldiers do not speak. They break before they speak.

Sidney is as free as he can be, but he isn’t free. He isn’t home, either. Evgeni has to remember this, has to hold it in mind when he finds himself noticing the shift of Sidney’s shoulders or the flex of tendon in his wrist when he reaches for the cups of tea Evgeni makes for him. Evgeni has never seen himself as reserved. Maybe compared to Alex. Yet with Sidney, Evgeni thinks he has to be.

There are times – more common that Evgeni likes – where Sidney is confused. He hides it well, but Evgeni sees it nonetheless. Apparently it is to be expected, but sometimes the sight of it makes Evgeni ache. Sidney flinches too, like it is a normal reaction when someone reaches to touch him (that worries Evgeni; keeps him up at night sometimes). Though he is healing, he’s healing slowly and inconsistently. There is still a scent of sickness that sticks to him; sour and bitter.

The doctors who are treating Sidney struggle to find a way to treat it.

“Physically, he appears to be improving,” they say pouring over various test reports and charts, puzzled.

But he isn’t fine.

Fae aren’t wolves. They’re not humans either. This is what the medical team eventually tell Evgeni. They are unknowns.

“There are no simple answers, here,” they say. “We are doing our best, but –”

Evgeni nods. “Nine pregnant women can’t make a baby in one month.”

They hum in agreement.

Maybe trying is the best anyone can do. The thought sits acerbic and unhappy in Evgeni.

It isn’t good enough.

There are no quick fixes. Not for Sidney or Evgeni.

“Maybe he knows how to heal himself,” Nikolay says when he checks in on Evgeni.

There is something in Nikolay’s voice.

Nikolay has old eyes and a young heart. Sitting next to Evgeni, he leans his shoulder against Evgeni’s. It’s such a gentle gesture. They were cubs together. Echoes of that comfort Evgeni now.

“I was afraid,” he admits, for the first time.

Nikolay nods.

“You’re safe now,” Nikolay promises.

Evgeni closes his eyes and he feels Nikolay press a kiss to his hair. Nikolay means everything he says and means everything he does. He always has. And Evgeni lets him relieve him of his duty and send him home.

 

 

The lines of communication with the capital become spotty – are always spotty – at this time of the year. From a few sources Evgeni hears that the mobile tower in the next territory over has been having some technical issues due to the extreme temperatures. It’s probable due to age more than weather, but if it gets the government to invest some money in a new one then they can say whatever will look the best in a report.

 Alex attempts to call more than a few times.

Evgeni doesn’t answer.

“The call keeps dropping out,” he says when his brother catches him.

Denis doesn’t believe him, but then Denis doesn’t particularly trust Alex after everything that has happened. Evgeni can’t blame him.

Alex might have a destiny, but just because he wants Sidney doesn’t mean that he can have him.

So Evgeni stalls.

 

 

(The thing about Evgeni is he might not trust Alex, but Alex has always trusted Evgeni).

 

 

During one of Sidney’s rehabilitation session he meets with Evgeni’s Alpha.

What first impression Sidney had of him wasn’t wrong, but perhaps it wasn’t right either. It is clearer now that Sergei Fedorov, as he introduces himself in English, was a soldier in a past life. He still might have ties to the military. There is nothing rusty about the way he moves or reacts. Tall, with strong shoulders and bright blue eyes, he is classically handsome. Yet more so than any physical features, he has a _presence_. There is a reason he is the alpha of this pack.

When he speaks to Sidney, he speaks to like is talking to an equal. It’s familiar in a way that few other things have been in the last few months.

There aren’t many soldiers in this place. Sidney sees it. He isn't blind.

Fedorov’s pack is filled with young, strong, brilliant wolves. They live in each other’s pockets. With their shoulders pressed together, they laugh and joke; their hands constantly reaching out for coat tails and collars and hair to ruffle. They scent mark each other carelessly, and love each other without embarrassment. Some are younger and many are older than Sidney, but none carry their age like it’s a weight. When they had tracked him, Sidney had seen their grace first hand. All instinct and confidence, they moved silently and easily as one cohesive unit. Sidney has never witnessed anything like it. They were so sure, and so capable; but none of them are soldiers.

He thinks he would be proud of that, if he were Fedorov. Maybe. Sidney isn’t sure.

This city is so, so still. Still and silent. Everyone knows the wars are long since over in Europe. Or everyone says they are. Sidney never truly believed that. He couldn’t imagine it. Growing up moving from one front to another, he couldn’t imagine it. How could they be? Yet the blood in the soil is old and the nights are safe. It’s quiet here. Maybe this was what his childhood was like. He can’t remember much of it, but maybe it could have been like this.

Sidney doesn’t know what to think of that either. He thinks Fedorov knows that.

“Your doctors say you’re almost ready to be released,” Fedorov says, as Sidney finishes up his session.

Sidney nods, scrubbing a towel through his sweaty hair. He knew that. His hands feel out of place. If he were at home he would have already been discharged and be back on his line. They both know that.

“Moscow called,” Fedorov says. “The Ovechkin’s are interested in having you transferred to a hospital in the capital while you finish your rehabilitation.”

Sidney – Sidney exhales and then inhales steadily.

Moscow. The Ovechkin’s.

He had… he hadn’t known what to expect after he was discharged, but that makes sense. It’s been awhile since the NHL floated a treatise with them and the KHL, but nothing is ever forgotten. Technically the terms were agreed to, if not acted on. 

Fedorov smiles a little, like he sees right through him. “Unfortunately the roads are closed, so you’re staying here for the time being.”

Waving away Sidney’s thanks before he can think to give it, Fedorov’s smile fades and becomes an expression Sidney recognises from superior officers back home; resolute and decided.

“I would like you to consider staying with my family for the duration of your stay here,” Fedorov tells him.

It isn’t an order, but Sidney doesn’t know what else it could be in the circumstances. It does not need to be said that Fedorov personally permitted Sidney’s entry and safety in his territory. It isn’t an unconditional offer. Sanctuary never is. Yet it is one from the Old World. It is also one that Fedorov doesn’t leave Sidney any choice but to accept.

“Thank you,” he says and Fedorov lets him.

There is probably a more formal way to express that. The simplicity of his answer feels uncouth. Over the years Sidney was taught manners, and retaught them too many times to count. Now, it doesn’t feel like he was taught anything other than how to speak to people with a higher rank than him.

“You are welcome,” Fedorov says. “It has been a long time since we welcomed an outsider to our territory.”

It is not clear if he expects Sidney to know where exactly they are. Either way, Sidney does not dare ask.

“A long time ago I made the same offer,” Fedorov adds unexpectedly. “I didn’t not expect that it would be accepted in this manner.”

Chancing it, Sidney glances at Fedorov.

Fedorov’s expression is perhaps wistful. “We cannot predict the future.”

Sidney finds himself snorting. No. Not them.

Fedorov grins a little. “I am glad I made the promise when I did. Please remember that.”

“Are you glad now?” Sidney asks.

Fedorov grin shifts into a smile. Its changes his face, filling it with something indescribable. 

“Now and then.” Fedorov tells him as if the matter is settled.

And in a way it is.

Some of the anxiety that Sidney had been carrying drains from him. Perhaps more than he realised. Sidney isn’t a stranger to werewolves, but he is to packs. Most are. Even many were’s themselves.

“Don’t worry,” Fedorov says, not as a warning but almost like he understands Sidney too well.

 

 

(There was a reason Sidney only spent one year in Shattuck-Saint Mary's.)

 

 

With Fedorov’s permission formally granted, it does not take long for Sidney to be declared well enough to be released. When he is, Fedorov takes him in.

“I have a spare room,” Evgeni argues when he finds out.

“You hardly spend any time in your home.”

Evgeni scoffs. “You like having me over to help with the kids.”

“I do,” Fedorov acknowledges. “And Kolya likes having you at his place and your brother appreciates all the help you’ve been giving him to fix up his home and your parents love having you home with them.”

Put like that, it sounds like Evgeni’s never home.

Fedorov smiles. “When was the last time you spent more than one night in a row at your place?”

Evgeni looks away but somehow manages to shrug. “I still have a spare room.”

“You don’t want Sidney in your spare room.”

Fedorov says it simply. Like it’s the truth.

Evgeni doesn’t have a response.

“Come and help me get his room ready,” Fedorov offers after a beat.

“You don’t need my help.”

Fedorov puts a comforting hand on Evgeni’s shoulder. “I always want your help.”

Evgeni snorts.

He hates how well people know him.

And he hates how easily he accepts Fedorov’s offer.

Fedorov house is a second home to the pack. It was built in the early 1900s and over the years it has been continuously renovated and expanded. There is never enough space to spare. Currently it’s home to three of his pack mate’s children that he is fostering, two pet cats, and at least a dozen rotating pack members. They are full to bursting. If Sidney were a wolf, he could always find a space on one of the couches by the radiator, like Evgeni does. But he isn’t.

“He needs a room of his own,” Fedorov says.

“There aren’t any free ones.”

“We’ll find one,” he tells Evgeni, handing him a box of toys to shift.

Over the course of one afternoon they clear out boxes upon boxes from Fedorov’s youngest foster daughter’s room and shift everything into his older daughter’s room. The girls have never shared before, but the novelty of it delights them.

“They live in each other’s pockets anyway,” he says, scooping up a tiny ball of fluff and paws that had climbed into one of the boxes.

Though the room is small, it takes most of the afternoon to clear it. Fedorov’s neighbour Corrina checks on them when they are close to finishing, with a set of clean linen that smells of mint and lavender.

“Almost finished?” she asks.

“Getting there,” Fedorov smiles, taking the linen from her hands.

Both she and Fedorov speak English. He is more fluent than she is, but he spent longer over in the New World than she did. Hopefully they are fluent enough to be a comfort to Sidney. From the scant conversations they’ve had with him, they know he’s foreign. If he is who Evgeni believes he is, he’s Canadian.

“We can’t know that for certain,” Corrina says.

“I do,” Evgeni says stubbornly.

Fedorov gives him a look. “It doesn’t matter. Either way, he’s clearly not Russian and pretty obviously doesn’t speak much of our language.”

Giving Evgeni the pillow cases, Fedorov deftly begins to remakes the bed while Evgeni and Corrina put the cases on the feather filled pillows.

Already the room feels welcoming. When they are finished, the cream coloured bedding looks soft and restful. Evgeni hopes Sidney likes it.

 

 

When Sidney arrives, he looks overwhelmed. Evgeni tries to show him to his room, but he’s shooed away before he can do more than say a brief ‘hello’.

 

 

Dinner is a table full of werewolves. It’s announced early; maybe an hour after the sun goes down. A plate is handed to Sidney when he finds his way downstairs. It’s warm in his hand from being in the oven. There is no ceremony. There are a few introductions when Sidney takes a free seat. Some faces are familiar, others are new. There are many names and some smiles. Everyone seems to know Sidney’s name. It is said and shared easily. Its use washes over Sidney.

Partway down the table, Sidney spots Evgeni’s familiar face. Squeezed between a wolf who was introduced as his brother Denis and a cousin whose name Sidney didn’t quite catch, he grins whenever he catches Sidney’s eye. This is used against him by his pack mates, who shamelessly swipe food from his plate. When Evgeni catches on, he lets out a squawk much to their amusement. A squabble breaks out shortly afterwards.

Sidney ducks his head.

The plate he was given is full. He – he eats mechanically. They called him a robot back home. Robot soldier.

His stomach aches.

At the head of the table, Fedorov sits with a small pup cradled in his arms. From the corner of Sidney’s eyes, he watches as Fedorov occasionally gives it small bits of food from his dinner plate. The sleeves of his Henley are rolled up to his strong forearms. The informality of it – of the entire dinner is almost jarring. Around him people are talking and laughing. A large cast iron casserole dish is being passed around the table. Occasionally someone reaches over to dip a piece of bread into the stew. When it reaches Evgeni, he uses the ladle to serve himself and the two pack mates sitting either side of him seconds.

“Would you like more?” Corrina asks in English, placing her hand on his shoulder to get his attention.

Sidney doesn’t know how to answer. It isn’t a difficult question. It isn’t even a question; in her other hand is a bowl of steamed potatoes and root vegetables that she’s holding out for him to take.

There is context.

There is no need for his breathing to go shallow.

This isn’t the bunker. He isn’t underground surrounded by cold iron. Corrina isn’t a guard or mercenary or kidnaper. She’s just Fedorov’s friend. She isn’t going to punish him. 

He manages to make himself nod.

“Thank you,” he tells her. He says it twice, once in English, once in Russian.  

He - he was taught manners. He takes the bowl and puts a spoonful of buttered potatoes on his plate. He eats them one by one and afterwards he retreats to the room he was given. Up in the eaves of the house, his corner room is small and warm. There is one window next to a twin bed. When he touches the glass it’s cold under his fingertips. Outside it is snowing again. The skyline of the city is obscured. Only a vague outline can be seen. It’s lost completely when the sun goes down.

For a little while he rests, as was told to do.

The pillows are soft and Sidney thinks he could sleep if his heart wasn’t pounding so loud in his chest.

Wolves hear everything – Sidney thinks Jack said that.

He would probably know, Sidney thinks. The last time Sidney heard from him, he’d been transferred to LA.

There is a lock on the door; a simple turning deadbolt. It’s new. There is some sawdust on the carpet. Sidney looks at it for a long time.

So far away from everything he knows, Sidney feels so far away from himself. What is a weapon without a war to hone it? What is a weapon if it’s not of use?

He doesn’t know.

Is this an _after_?

He doesn’t know.

He can’t remember a _before_.

 

 

(Sleep doesn’t come.)

 

 

(Sometime after midnight, in the early hours of the new day, Sidney locks himself in the upstairs’ bathroom. When he flicks on the lights, he can’t see. It takes his eyes too long to adjust and it makes his head ache. Under his feet there is a chill to the tiles, but the air is warm. The house is warm.

Under the bright light, Sidney strips; hissing as he pulls his sweater and long sleeved Henley over his head at the same time, and trying not to wince as he unbuttons his jeans.

All borrowed. Or given. Or something.

In the mirror his body looks like something foreign. Something fragile. Lines and shadows, bruised red, purple and blue. He cards a hand through his hair, pulling it away from his temple. Butterfly stitches. Stitches in black thread.

Sidney looks away.

The water takes time to heat up. The pipes rattle when he turns the shower taps.

Inside his chest, he feels hollowed out.)

 

 

Sidney’s first few days under Fedorov’s roof are chaotic in a way that jars his frayed nerves.

There is always something happening in the Fedorov household.

There is no routine but there is a rhythm. Sidney was used to waking up at all hours back in Pittsburgh, but here he wakes to the sound of a pack – a family. Through the thin walls Sidney’s room he hears the young wolves scampering and sneaking about. They yelp and yip with delight when their parents wake up, and sleep in any patch of sunshine they can find. Fedorov is forever stepping over them. Never once does he trip. Corrina’s reflexes aren’t quite as sharp, but she usually saves herself from tumbling.

No door in the house is ever locked.

Pack mates – young and old – come and go freely.

There are so many faces and names to remember.

Some people talk to him like he can understand them. Others talk around him; checking in with Fedorov or Corrina to translate. A few pack members, like Evgeni, pull out their clearly rusty and heavily accented English. Sidney – his voice feels rusty too. He hadn’t uttered a work to the abductors. He was trained only to give his name, rank, and serial number. Back in the Maritimes, when Sidney was the youngest triple A on the Dartmouth unit, he had to repeat it. It felt like pulling teeth and never got any easier.

Jaromir Jagr had laughed bitterly when he found out.

Mario hadn’t.

Neither of them was surprised. Out of the two of them, Jaromir was the one who told Sidney why. He felt like a fool afterwards.

Sometimes Sidney still feels like one.

The pack doesn’t ask for anything. Sidney supposes they already have everything they need – they have his name. Somehow Evgeni had it and he gave it to them. It’s used by everyone. From the youngest pack members, to the oldest. However it hasn’t once been said sharply. In the morning, it’s called up the staircase and used to get his attention.

It’s used kindly, Sidney thinks. They are kind.

From Fedorov’s library, Corrina finds a battered Russian to English phrase book. Over breakfast she presents it to Sidney. It is quickly snagged by Evgeni who flips through it to find ‘Hello.’ Sidney knows that one, but he finds himself repeating Evgeni and trying to copy his exact pronunciation. The single word is received with a smile. Sidney thinks he manages to return it.

Ducking his head, Evgeni searches through the pages for something else. Sidney isn’t sure what.

What Russian Sidney does speak isn’t exactly something made for conversations over a dining table, but neither is his English or French after so many years in the NHL and NHL-affiliated units. The last time he spoke to a civilian was a ceremonial dinner, where he had a conversation with Nathalie Lemieux. He isn’t sure she counts. They talked about the decaying city wards, which in retrospect wasn’t much of a departure for either of them.

The thought of Nathalie – he can’t think about her. He can’t.

Though he is no longer in danger – no longer in a cage – he isn’t in Pittsburgh. He isn’t sure how to get back there. There are fractures inside the core of himself; his magic feels so far away from his reach. So do the ley lines. Night after night, he has makes his way down to the river which runs through the heart of the city, yet the ley lines do not alter. Standing solid and strong, the borders are quiet each time Sidney reaches out to test them. The city is quiet too, but not silent. It feels old to Sidney, and it has edges. Some Sidney doesn’t see them until he feels Evgeni nudge him away.

No harm comes Sidney way when Evgeni is close.

All legs and thick grey fur in his wolf form, Evgeni moves with grace that belies his size and his age. Few of the weres in this pack act like soldiers. Evgeni manages to mimic one. The kidnappers were fooled by the act. The strength he moves with was enough to suggest a litany of things, especially once armed. But now, Sidney can see through that. Certainly Evgeni is highly trained – the more time Sidney spends with Evgeni the clearer it becomes that he has the potential to be a force to be reckoned with. However Evgeni isn’t tested. Not the way Sidney and Fedorov are – not in the way soldiers in the New World are. Sidney can see that in Evgeni’s eyes and his hands. There are no shadows in him. And his heart; he wears it so openly.

On the other side of the table, one of Fedorov’s children leans over Evgeni’s shoulder. Her expression is openly curious – not just about when Evgeni is doing but by Sidney himself.

“How are you?” Evgeni asks when he finds the right passage.

His eyes are bright, and so are those of the young were.

Sidney chews and swallows a spoonful of porridge.

“Good,” he answers, first in English and then in the equivalent Russian. Or what he hopes is the equivalent.

Sidney thinks Evgeni would keep going but Corrina reaches over and takes the book from his hands.

“Get your own,” she tells Evgeni, handing the book back over to Sidney.

Evgeni makes a face. So does Fedorov’s daughter.

She and her siblings always seem to be in the periphery of Sidney’s field of vision; never within arms reach, but always close.    

“We don’t get many outsiders,” Corrina says, smoothing a hand over the young cub’s dark hair.

Sidney nods, suddenly very conscious of the same he inhabits.

There is a lull after breakfast, when the pack scatters. Some to school, others to work, and some like Fedorov and Evgeni to the pack barracks for a training module. They had left not quite dressed in their uniforms, but with heavy backpacks in the back of Fedorov’s jeep. In their wake, the house is quiet. Corrina stays for an hour or so; quietly repairing an old watch before she is called out by one of her work colleagues. It is strange to be alone – or near enough to it. The street – the city – is pack.

Outside the windows, he sees movement occasionally; a neighbour is shovelling snow; a car driving past the house slightly under the speed limit; paw prints in the snow.

Over all of their heads, the sky is low and dark. It presses down on all of them. For some reason, Sidney feels out of breath. He tries to inhale deeply.

On his feet before he realises what he’s doing, Sidney retreats away from the windows and unlocked doors. When he is alone, he sits, bringing his knees to his chest. Flipping through the book, he takes in the dog-eared pages, the handwritten notations inscribed by several different hands, and the occasional highlighted section. Most of the latter give context to where and what unit Fedorov served in.

Between the phrasebook and their mutually limited fluency in each other’s primary language, Evgeni confirms Sidney’s suspicions when he appears in the late afternoon with a plate of biscuits and tea.

“Detroit,” Evgeni says. “Red Wings.”

The Red Wings.

They were infamous. They still are.

Their victories had reverberated across the country. Sidney even felt them in Minnesota. Everyone knew them. They changed the seasons and made night into day.

When Evgeni reaches for the phrasebook, Sidney lets him take it.

Evgeni only seems to speak a little English, but no matter what language he always speaks like Sidney can understand him. Sidney – Sidney does, to an extent, not that he’ll let it show. 

“I wanted to be a Red Wing,” Evgeni says shifting from English to Russian as he carefully unfolds some of the dog-eared pages. “It was my dream, since I was a boy.”

He’s still a boy, Sidney thinks.

Then Evgeni grins, maybe a little sly and says in English. “Or Penguin. Like you.”

Sidney huffs.

He doesn’t understand how Evgeni knows any of these things about him.

“Everyone knows you,” Evgeni says, like Sidney had spoken aloud.

There is something so earnest in Evgeni’s hushed voice. Sidney opens his mouth to speak, but doesn’t know how to respond.

Carefully, Evgeni nudges Sidney, beckoning him to take another biscuit. They’re sweet and dusted in fine sugar. They are still warm from the oven.

“For you,” he says.

There is something very earnest about that to. Or maybe about Evgeni in general.

Sidney doesn’t know how to feel about him.

Sidney doesn’t know how he feels about anything.

Evgeni found him and brought him to his pack – to the only place a were would consider safe. Sacred.

 

 

(Sidney is so far from home. He doesn’t think he’d be able to find his way back even if he wanted to.

He sleeps oddly. Sometimes he dreams. Most of the time he would prefer if he didn’t.

Every action creates a ripple of reaction.

There are ruins everywhere; least of all inside Sidney.)

 

 

That night there are two moons in the sky. Twin moons. Both are full and bright in the night sky.

“It’s dust,’ Fedorov says, when he finds Sidney standing by the door. “Dust and smoke from the steel works.”

A trick of the light. But that’s a kind of magic too.

“You can go,” Fedorov says.

The front door is unlocked. It always is.

Sidney tears his eyes away from it. He looks at Fedorov; he isn’t sure Fedorov sees when he looks back at him.

Behind them the pack is settling down; a movie is playing in the den and a card game is happening in the kitchen.

Sidney – “No,” he says. “It’s ok.”

 

 

(Sidney stays.)

 

 

(Sidney stays.

He stays and when he turns his back on the door, he finds a place saved for him by Evgeni’s side. There is one that night in the den and there is one the following day in the kitchen when Evgeni hands Sidney a plate of sweet pancakes. With his dark hair tangled around his head and wolf fur all over his knitted jumper, he’s grumbling about something. Sidney doesn’t catch what, but he listens with one ear while they eat next to each other.)

 

 

Not surprisingly, Nikolay takes to Sidney easily. “I can see why you like him.”

Evgeni isn’t sure what that is meant to mean.

Nikolay doesn’t offer any explanations.

After mountain training, he drops by the Fedorov’s place with a bag of donated clothing. Evgeni should have probably thought of organising something like that. When he says as much, Nikolay grins a little.

“There’s still time,” he says, and Evgeni isn’t sure if he likes Nikolay’s tone of voice.

Taking the bag from Nikolay’s arms, Evgeni sets it down on the Fedorov’s kitchen table and lets the Fedorov foster pups sort through them. Nikolay must have sought donations from at least a dozen different people including Evgeni’s own family. The sizes are a little hit or miss. Sidney is in the middle of what looks like an uneven growth spurt. A coat that Evgeni vaguely remembers Nikolay wearing a year ago fits him, while he will probably grow into Denis’s old sweaters. One has a hole near the collar. It isn’t big, but Evgeni goes to put the sweater away because he doesn’t like the idea of Sidney wearing something that is falling apart.

“We can mend it,” Nikolay says, stopping Evgeni.

Somehow it isn’t surprising that Nikolay can– over dinner he darns the hole. His stitches are neat and even. When he finishes, the hole is hardly noticeable. With a scarf around Sidney’s neck, no one would know it was there.

Sidney isn’t pack, but he is under their protection – and their care.

There is a certain softness in his eyes when he takes the offered sweater. Evgeni likes it. Evgeni likes everything, really.

“You can’t help it,” Nikolay says when they are walking home together.

Evgeni doesn’t want to.

That makes Nikolay smile a little.

They have similar hearts. Though much to Evgeni’s chagrin, Nikolay has somehow managed to convince people otherwise. Sensible and wise beyond his years, Nikolay isn’t in contention for leadership within the pack but probably should be. He claims he doesn’t care, and the kicker is he is honest. All he’s ever needed or wanted was purpose. He’s never been bothered with prestige or honours.

At the traffic lights they scuffle over that. Nikolay has more muscle mass, but Evgeni has longer arms and better reach. He also plays dirty. They end up dirtying their jeans and scraping their hands. It’s stupid really, and they hear about it later at family dinner with their parents. Nothing stays a secret in their pack. Even Sidney finds out about it, and he has a hint of a smile on his face the next time Evgeni sees him.

Lately Sidney has started to smile more and more.

Loud or unexpected noises still make him flinch, but the level caution and unrelenting vigilance he holds himself with are slowly decreasing. Evgeni can’t imagine it is an easy state to maintain. The trust it takes for Sidney to lower his guard means so much. None of them know Sidney’s past – not even Evgeni. For all that Evgeni had heard stories of Sidney’s exploits and read the classified files Alex stole from his mother’s office; he does not know many of the particulars. Second hand facts are different than ones freely offered and Sidney is careful not to share anything sensitive. Anything he does say, Evgeni hoards and replays over and over in his head when he is alone.

Knowing Sidney now, Evgeni thinks he is much more than his reputation.

“Did you know him before?” Evgeni asks.

Fedorov shakes his head. “I only knew of him. He was under Lemieux’s protection. Before that, the Canadian’s tried to claim him as their own.”

Sometimes it is hard to remember that it has been little under a year since Fedorov left the New World and their pack somehow managed to lure him to their territory. It sometimes feels as if he has always been their Alpha. However he was once the brightest star in the NHL’s and he fought the same fight as Sidney.

Fedorov’s kids like Sidney, curious and full of wonder they stare at him from alcoves and hidden behind furniture. They don’t know anything about him, only that he is not a wolf. Sidney in turn, watches them out of the corner of his eyes. Both parties seem to find novelty in the other. Fedorov and Corrina find it amusing and often share stories of Sidney and the girls bonding over cartoons and TV dinners.

“He’s not what I expected of the great New World’s changeling,” Fedorov comments idly. 

Evgeni shakes his head. He wouldn’t have expected it either. But maybe that sums up his life lately.

 

 

The days grow shorter and shorter. In turn, the nights become longer.

Snow falls. Schools close for a few days. Roads are closed. Roads reopen. Live goes on.

Sometimes Sidney sits by the window in his room at night and looks at the stars. Inside his chest, his heart beats. Night-time feels fragile in the way the forbearing Stygian sky of Pittsburgh never did. Above him the stars flicker in the sky, like moths dancing to and fro. It’s mesmerising.

Like him, Fedorov is often up in the middle of the night. Usually he is pouring over pack paperwork. Maybe there is peace in his territory, but Sidney recognises politics in the paper trail. In the time he has been living in Fedorov’s home, Sidney has become used to seeing him walk about with a cub in one hand and laptop in the other. They have coffee in the early hours. Fedorov has a stash he keeps, tucked away behind the tea.

“I got a taste for it in Detroit,” Fedorov admits. “Blame Nicky.”

Nicky being Nicklas Lidström, Sidney realises after a beat.

The thought is too big to even begin to digest.

“You can ask,” Fedorov says with a crooked smile.

Sidney can’t.

He can’t even begin to think about asking.

“You remind of your Captain," Fedorov says once.

Sidney glances at him and Fedorov smiles.

“A little,” he adds. “Sometimes you remind me of Gretzky.”

Sidney huffs out a half-hearted laugh. That, is something Sidney knows better to even think about thinking about. Instead he drinks coffee with Fedorov.

“Can’t sleep?” Fedorov asks sometimes.

There are no secrets living under the same roof.

Sidney shrugs.

Sometimes he does. Sometimes he doesn’t. Sometimes he’s just too restless and needs to move – needs to be out there walking the ley lines looking for a way through them. A way back to where he belongs.

Fedorov sees right through him.

“Wait until morning,” Fedorov tells him a few times, pouring him another cup. “It’s too cold out there for even us were’s.” 

It’s hard to listen on those nights.

Sidney doesn’t see anything. He’s not a mystic. The future isn’t for him to know. But instincts go deep. Something inside him knows he should be outside; should be by the river in the space where the echoes of the ley lines can be felt. It’s bone deep knowledge. His commander back home, Michel Therrien, would hate that. He’d probably say Sidney was going to seed out in the sticks. It’s hard to know what edge Sidney had back in Pittsburgh. He feels sharper here and exactly what people said he was; exactly what he is.

He wasn’t meant for any of this.

He is a lie, the blade of a knife, and he sleeps under their roof.

Truth outs, given time. They must see that.

Sidney doesn’t think Evgeni does; Evgeni who knew Sidney’s name without being given it.

He is a near constant presence – there nearly every day with his gentle eyes and easy smiles. If Sidney is honest, he knows he is often the one who finds his way to Evgeni’s side rather than vice versa. Not too close, but close enough to take the fresh baked pastries Evgeni brings over each morning and to laugh when Evgeni shakes the snow off his grey fur coat and onto Sidney before slipping away to the mudroom to shift back to his human form.

It’s something Sidney holds close and something he is too afraid to examine too closely.

Every second or third night Evgeni sleeps on the den couch. In his human form he sprawls over the couch, all long limbs. Occasionally he is beaten to the couch by one of his pack mates. On those nights he shifts and curls up in a ball of thick, dappled grey and white fluff. He’s still all long limbs like that. Together he sleeps in a tangle of other wolves, peaceful and lost to the world.

In the morning he makes grumbling, growling sounds when disturbed. Nothing wakes him before he is ready.

Sometimes, on days that are particular busy in the Fedorov household, Sidney finds himself nursing a cup of tea in the den. It’s sweet in a way he isn’t used too. Steam curls up from it, and Evgeni’s nose twitches.

He says something sleepily.

Sidney doesn’t understand.

Evgeni groans. His eyes open a little, but they’re hidden by his tangle of dark hair.

“Sid,” he says, his voice soft.

Sidney feels – he doesn’t know. He hands Evgeni his tea.

More and more Evgeni talks like Sidney can understand him. It’s… something. Something he doesn’t know what to do with.

Sitting down on the floor, Sidney leans his back up against the couch. The noise from the packed kitchen and dining room echoes down the hall. Sidney can pick out few voices he knows, but not many. It’s hard to get his mind around everything. It’s hard to even try. Above him, Evgeni half sits up. The t-shirt and boxers he slept in are twisted and wrinkled, but he doesn’t seem to notice. After he takes a sip of tea, he leans down and hands the cup back to Sidney. As he does, his shirt pulls up and a strip of pale skin is exposed.

“Sid best,” Evgeni says.

Sidney looks away. 

 

 

Hours pass like honey.

As the days grow ever shorter, Sidney’s bones mend and his heart beats stronger each hour. When he lets himself, he sleeps.

On Evgeni’s free days, he takes Sidney out.

Through some unspoken agreement with Fedorov, Evgeni doesn’t take Sidney far. Mostly they walk through the neighbourhood when the weather is fair enough to do so. Sometimes Evgeni takes him to Nikolay’s home, where they trade off watching movies and playing video games. The two of them are highly competitive and combative. Loud too. Normally, Sidney probably would be just as bad, but still recovering, he tires easily. Mid-way through a game, he falls asleep and sleeps through lunch. A plate is saved for him; a bowl of dumplings in broth. It’s mild on his still occasionally uneasy stomach. In the hospital Sidney had caught sight of some of the information on his medical chart; he’d lost weight. The first time he had been alone in Fedorov’s upstairs bathroom, Sidney had fully taken it in; his body strangely frail in the fogged up bathroom mirror. He was already light on to begin with. It was mid-season. Everyone was spread thin.

“I made it,” Nikolay tells Sidney, as he eats.

He talks to Sidney like Evgeni does; like Sidney can understand.

Sidney thinks more than anyone else in the pack, maybe even more than Fedorov, Nikolay believes Evgeni; and takes him at his word. They are as much brothers as Denis and Evgeni are.

“It’s good,” Sidney tells him. Or tries to.

Nikolay huffs out an incredulous laugh.

Sidney thinks maybe he might have said something else by mistake.

“Fuck yeah,” Nikolay replies in English.

Sprawled on the couch, Evgeni grins. His eyes are dancing with mirth.

Sidney blushes; which makes it worse.

“Who taught you that?” Evgeni asks, delighted.

Pointedly, Sidney pretends not to understand him. It’s not an original tactic, and his pretty sure they are both starting to see through it. Or him. Both, probably.

 

 

Christmas comes and goes. New Year’s Eve is celebrated with a party that spills out of Fedorov’s home and into the neighbourhood. Sidney placed himself carefully out of the way, but it doesn’t stop the pack from finding him. A bottle of fizzy and sweet liquor is passed around. It even reaches him, sitting half hidden at the top of the staircase. It feels illicit to Sidney even though it’s not. Not that much later, flutes of champagne are handed out. The golden liquor bubbles and Sidney nurses it while sparklers are handed out.

“For children,” Nikolay says, lip twitching.

And for Evgeni, it turns out.

When they all file outside near midnight, Evgeni has a packet in his hands. With his white duffle coat open and missing his scarf, he is luminous. The darkness doesn’t touch him. It can’t, Sidney thinks. Sidney can’t take his eyes off him. His dark hair is messy and his eyes are so bright. Bounding over to Sidney, he laces his fingers through Sidney’s and tugs him out into the garden. Sidney can only follow.

Golden light spills out of the house, and the fairy lights strung up around the garden twinkle.

It’s starting to snow lightly.

Standing close, Sidney takes the sparklers Evgeni hands him, and watches as he tries to light them. Flicking but not catching alight, he fusses with the lighter. Behind them, children are badgering Nikolay to light their sparklers. In the back corner of the garden, Fedorov and Corrina are setting up the fireworks.

Their sparklers catch around the time everyone starts counting down.

The burst of light is so bright; Evgeni steps back.

Children are racing around. With a holler, Nikolay and Denis join in. They rush past Evgeni. Sidney expects him to give chase.

He doesn’t.

“Three, two, one!”

The fireworks take are set off with a loud bang that makes Sidney jump. They fill the sky with a burst of lime green, pink and purple.

When he lowers his gaze from the sky, he finds Evgeni looking at him. His eyes are soft and the fireworks reflect off him, painting him in colours.

Leaning down, he raises his voice to be heard over everything. “Happy New Year.”

Sidney echoes it, in Russian. Evgeni’s gaze softens, and stepping close, he presses a kiss to the corner of Sidney’s mouth. 

“Happy New Year, Sid,” he says again, in English, his voice low.

 

 

(The following day is quiet.

Sidney wakes in his room. He’s still wearing his homemade jumper, but thankfully had the sense to shed his jeans. On the rug next to his bed four wolves are tangled a sleeping knot. When Sidney rolls over and manages to sleepily reach his hand down, Evgeni snuffles and presses his muzzle against his palm. Closing his dark eyes, Evgeni sighs.

Inside Sidney’s chest, his heart beats steady and sure.)

 

 

In the New Year, Sidney learns the neighbourhood rather than the river.

“You’re not a prisoner,” Fedorov reminds him whenever he catches Sidney looking at the door or out windows.

“I’m not – ” Sidney starts to say, but he doesn’t know where to go from there.

His feet find the well-trodden path of weres and he learns the cracks in the pavement and difference between the sound of dogs and the sound of weres. Homes are small and oddly spaced out. Many are built from repurposed materials of dismantled bloc apartments. No one bothers to knock or lock doors. Were’s live in each other’s pockets. Evgeni seems to have a bed wherever he goes. His own home is warm and within walking distance to nearly every pack member that he introduces Sidney to. Mostly though he curls up in the Fedorov’s front room some nights, while other nights he heads off with his friends and ends up crashing with one of them. Usually his brother or Nikolay is amongst the rambunctious group.

Once or twice Sidney tags along.

It’s overwhelming. Evgeni’s friends are loud, generous and now joke about Sidney’s escape like it’s just another hilarious story that forms part of their shared history. The edges of the story get changed a little with each retelling. Sidney likes that. His Russian is better now. He usually gets most of the punchlines and if he doesn’t, his cluelessness isn’t made into a new punchline. The comradery between them is easy and freely shared.

It reminds him a little of home; late nights with Colby and Jordan, shots of whatever horrifying thing Max and Ryan can get bartenders to make, sneaking out of barracks to see Jack and Kris. Evgeni would probably like them. Knowing them, they would probably like him too. It’s… something Sidney doesn’t know what to do with.

It’s easy, here, to forget.

It’s so quiet, and so safe.

It feels like a different world to Pittsburgh; it’s so far removed the dirt and blood and darkness of the war.

Something must show on his face, because Evgeni checks in with him. “Sid?”

Shaking his head, Sidney tries to reassure Evgeni that he’s fine. He is. It isn’t a lie.

“Home?” Evgeni asks.

Sidney shakes his head again. He doesn’t want to go back yet.

Evgeni looks at him; Sidney isn’t sure what he sees.

“Later,” Evgeni decides after a beat.

The night is young yet. Maybe Sidney isn’t up for joining in with any of the rambunctious dancing or drinking, but he likes being there. For a few hours he stays and takes it all in. When the group heads off to another club, Sidney and Evgeni peel away. With his ears ringing and his heart pounding, Sidney feels breathless.

Under the street lights, Evgeni pulls Sidney close while they wait for their lift home.

Tentatively, Sidney leans against him, leans into his touch. No one has ever touched him as much as Evgeni does. He reaches for Sidney like it’s easy, like he doesn’t think twice about bringing him close. He smiles so easily too. Sidney thinks he should always smile. Maybe with a few beers and a couple of shots in his system, he says that.

Evgeni grins. “You too.” 

He’s maybe laughing at Sidney. Sidney must say that, because then Evgeni is laughing.

“Only a little,” Evgeni tells him.

There is colour in Evgeni’s cheeks and his eyes are bright. He looks happy. Sometimes Sidney thinks maybe he might not always be. Though that might be how people are.

Sidney isn’t oblivious.

He knows he isn’t good at things like this. There is a reason people back home always laugh. It wasn’t like they tried hard to hide their running jokes from him. Yet a world apart from them, Sidney tucks his hands close to keep track of them. They aren’t trembling, but maybe Sidney might be. When Evgeni notices, he gathers Sidney closer. His hands are gentle; always gentle.

“You’re cold,” he tells Sidney.

Sidney is. Was. He isn’t when Evgeni zips up his jacket and rubs his hands between his.

 

 

(Sidney has never understood people, but he thinks Evgeni could understand him.)

 

 

Time passes and bones heal. There is no magic in that but Sidney is changed by it nonetheless.

The river running through the city freezes after a particularly cold week and the pack decides to close the last highway out of the city. Sidney is present for some of the informal discussions that happen over pack dinners. It’s a collaborative process and somehow Sidney finds himself invited to tag along when Nikolay is sent out to supervise the closure. It’s surreal to drive to the city line. What memories he has of his arrival are blurred.

At the edge of the road, Sidney looks at the road signage; the Cyrillic letters are partly covered by frost. With a gloved hand, he reaches up and brushes it away.

“Magnit – ” he tries to say, but he gets caught up on the vowels. 

“Magnitogorsk,” Nikolay says from behind him. He and a pack mate are carrying the portable signage out to the freeway entry ramp. Each breath they take becomes crystallised in the cold. 

Sidney repeats it. “Magnitogorsk.”

Magnitogorsk.

Oh.

“Sid,” Evgeni calls out.

Up ahead of him, Evgeni’s face is bright and open. He says something else, something Sidney doesn’t quite catch and he motions Sidney over to him

Standing on the roadside, Evgeni reaches for Sidney’s arm when he gets close and leads him into the snow. There is something so bright about his expression. Sidney isn’t sure what to make of it, only that seeing it makes Sidney smile in response.

Evgeni leads Sidney about twenty to thirty meters away from the road, and then releases Sidney’s hand. Dropping to his knees, he starts digging. The contrast between his dark gloves and the snow is stark. He digs maybe a foot down, maybe a little more. It’s puzzling. Then there is a flash of something gold.

Drawn closer, Sidney watches as Evgeni brushes the last of the snow aside to reveal something he’s never seen in real life before.

The two headed eagle of the Romanov’s.

It must be older than the city of Magnitogorsk.

The feathers are finely threaded with gold; it’s clearly a mass produced ward. As much as a royal ward could be mass produced, Sidney guesses, touching it.

It’s tarnished though.

Gold should never tarnish.

But then, the Romanov’s are dead and gone. The ward feels null and void of any of their magic.

He could probably fix it; infuse it with his own magic, but he doesn’t think that is why Evgeni is showing it to him.

Looking up, Sidney finds Evgeni is watching at him. His eyes are soft. Sidney doesn’t know what he sees. He’s been told before that there is something a little too sharp about his features, something not quite right about his mouth when he smiles or laughs. And he’s always known ‘not quite right’ meant ‘not quite human.’ But then, neither of them are quite human. Not when it seems to count. Rocking back onto his heels, Sidney doesn’t know what to say. Here they are, in the snow with the echoes of the past dynasties under them.

There were fae in Catherine the Great’s royal court. Hers was one of the only human royal courts they graced with their presence. Or so the stories go.

He looks down at the ward.

It’s still here, even if none of the Romanov’s are anymore.

Sidney and Evgeni are here too.

Of all the places in the world, they are here, kneeling in the snow with each of their breaths crystallised by the cold.  

 “Thank you,” he tells Evgeni.

Evgeni smiles. The corners of his eyes crinkle as he does.

 

 

(Partway through the afternoon Evgeni and a couple of his pack mates shift; leaving Nikolay to anchor the last of the blockages. Sitting on the bonnet of Evgeni’s car, Sidney watches as they race through the snow. Blurs of grey and white, they play like puppies and bark at Nikolay to hurry up and join them.

For the first time Sidney can remember, his head is quiet and his heart beats steadily. )

 

 

They head back into Magnitogorsk mid-afternoon, before it gets too late. On the drive back, Nikolay and Anton squabble over the satellite radio, ignoring Evgeni’s suggestions to plug in his phone and play some of his music. Sidney smirks – he turns his head tries to hide it, but Evgeni sees. Nudging him, Evgeni makes a face. Sidney manages to feign unaffected, but only for a moment before he breaks into a snort of laughter. It’s infectious, and Evgeni can’t help but join in much to the confusion of everyone else in the jeep.

Nikolay drops them off on the way back to the barracks. Though he offers to make a detour, it’s not a long walk. There is still some sunlight left and it feels good to be outside. Everything looks different during the day. But having Evgeni by his side feels the same.

Out of the corner of his eye, he watches Evgeni.

No matter what form Evgeni takes, he is made to move; his long legs cover ground easily. Gracefully.

During Sidney’s service, he has seen some of the best were’s of their generation. Evgeni probably is as good, or better, than all of them. What little magic Sidney currently has at his disposal, didn’t touch Evgeni back in the beginning when he tracked him down after his first escape attempt and took him to hospital. It didn’t ruffle a hair on his head. Sidney doubts he even noticed.

Sidney tucks his hands into his pockets.

Pittsburgh feels a million miles away.

Evgeni talks as they walk. His voice is low and easy to listen to. He doesn’t talk about anything in particular. Mostly he tells Sidney stories of growing up here, of getting into trouble with his pack mates, of his schooldays and stories of his family. Some Sidney understands, some he doesn’t. Once or twice he tells jokes that take Sidney off guard and make him laugh.

Evgeni laughs too; it’s disarming. He is disarming.

They reach Fedorov’s street before Sidney realises it. But outside the doorstep Evgeni says goodbye instead of coming inside.

“My mama and papa are cooking,” he tells Sidney.

There is something very kind in his eyes and Sidney doesn’t know what to do with that. He doesn’t know what to do with anything, really.

Evgeni shifts, drawing close and Sidney’s heart changes tempo in his chest.

Evgeni must know. He must.

Yet he doesn’t move.

Everything feels delicate and Sidney – he has no idea what he is doing. Only Evgeni is luminous and his eyes are dark and Sidney wants. It unfolds awkwardly inside him. Unsure and unfamiliar.

Caught between moments, Sidney feels fragile and stupid and full of want.

An inhaled breath –

And Evgeni steps back, out of Sidney’s reach.

“Zhenya…”

Evgeni combs a hand through his hair. His expression is suddenly unreadable.

“It’s ok,” Sidney finds himself saying.

“Sid,” Evgeni says. His voice sounds pained.

After a moment of consideration, he reaches out and wraps his arms around Sidney. The breath in Sidney’s throat gets caught. Gently, Evgeni brings Sidney close, and holds him. It’ – it’s. It’s almost too much. With conscious effort, Sidney manages to exhale. It comes out shaky. By his side, his hands twitch. And Sidney sways, just a little. As he does, Evgeni ducks his head down just for a second and breathes; not quite scenting him before releasing him.

Stepping back, Evgeni looks anywhere but at Sidney.

“I’ll see you later,” he says, and then he’s halfway down the path and out of Fedorov’s frozen garden before Sidney can process what is happening – what has happened.

 

 

(Sidney – Sidney can’t remember the last time anyone hugged him).

 

 

Inside Evgeni’s head, his mind is loud and jumbled. In an attempt to counteract the ceaseless noise he lets his pack keep him busy for the rest of the week. It doesn’t do much good. On Saturday morning he gives in and he finds himself convincing Sidney to help him go to double check Nikolay’s backup generator. He isn’t hard to convince. When he sees Evgeni, he smiles brightly and Evgeni feels stupid for avoiding him.

Like Evgeni, Nikolay inherited an old family home; his from his great, great uncle. Slowly he had been modernising it. By midmorning a handful of pack mates have found them. Most of them are from Evgeni’s training unit. Konstantin Simchuk is the only one with any real ability to fix anything mechanical, but that doesn’t stop Alexei Kaigorodov and Dmitri Kalinin from giving their opinions.

They talk shit mostly. And slow down any real progress.

“You talk shit,” Anton Khudobin says.

It’s Anton first winter with Metallurg. His pack in Kazakhstan sent him on exchange. It’s on the books, as far as things go. Technically he’s being mentored by Konstantin. Mostly he knows what he’s doing. Like Konstantin, he has a talent for working with magic. Or dissolving it. It’s not a rare skill in the general population, it is a unique skill for a were to possess. A few hundred years ago it would have been more valuable. But a few hundred years ago they would have been on the front, fighting, rather than in Nikolay’s frozen garden trying to find out why his backup generator keeps failing.

“You are shit,” Evgeni tells him, and for his trouble he gets tackled into the snow.

Mid tussle they end up shifting; Anton smarting when Evgeni bites at the fluff of his tail. Play fighting, they trade the upper hand back and forth, and then race around the birch trees. Dancing around the slender trunks, they bark and yelp at each other. It’s childish and entirely unhelpful. Though they draw Alexei and Dmitri into the fray, which probably lets Konstantin and Nikolay actually do some work.

 The game ends with them panting in a tangle mess.

Evgeni feels a bruise on his flank forming thanks to one of Dmitri’s bites and another on his side after skidding into a tree. Nosing at Anton’s muzzle, Evgeni licks his tongue over a scratch he thinks he gave him. Anton grumbles a little, but subsides under Evgeni’s care. They’re the same age. They were both born in the summer, under a clear blue sky. Above them now, there are dark grey clouds.

“A blizzard is coming soon,” Sidney says, when he finds them. “Kolya says it’s time to head home.”

Evgeni whines.

Sidney grins.

“Come on,” Sidney tells them all.

Letting out a huff, they get to their feet and shake off the snow. Anton and Alexei shift mid shake. Their bodies’ fluid in motion. Evgeni waits until he is inside the warmth of Nikolay’s home. Tea is waiting for him and left over cake Nikolay made the day before. It crumbles in his hand as he eats it; sweet and scented with orange blossom. A recipe given from their great aunt.

Most pack members are related somewhere down the line, though the line is blurred for all of them. Magnitogorsk isn’t any different from Chelyabinsk. Both towns were manmade – solutions to the ‘were’ problem.  No one in Evgeni’s family remembers where they came from before they were assigned to Magnitogorsk. But their bones and flesh were made for the cold, so maybe it doesn’t matter.

“It was good to see you having fun,” Denis says later when it is just the two of them.

Evgeni makes a face. He is not a child.

“You could have fooled me,” Denis grins.

 

 

Sidney still sometimes runs. Not as often as he first did, but often enough Evgeni supposes. Usually he stops without Evgeni having to step in to nudge him with his nose or tug on his shirt tail. They might not speak the same language but they understand each other. Maybe Sidney will always run. It’s probably in his blood like the moon and stars are in Evgeni’s. Evgeni can’t hold it against him, nor does Evgeni mind following him. Lately, it feels more like they go out into the night together.

There is something about the way Sidney moves and the way Evgeni can slide into and out of his space – the way Sidney lets him – that Evgeni responds too.

Once, his mother catches Evgeni flipping through his old school books.

“I just want to talk to him,” he tells her.

“Zhenya,” she mutters, stroking his hair.

He feels his cheeks colour.

He knows. He does.

His mother though, he kisses his temple and he can smell her worry. He has always worried her.

“Your heart,” she murmurs. “Always leading you into trouble.”

“I don’t think he’s trouble,” he tells her. Because he doesn’t.

 

 

(Evgeni knows trouble. He is trouble.)

 

 

A few times, Evgeni takes Sidney back to his place.

It’s strange having Sidney there. For the longest time his home has been entirely his own. From the kitchen, Evgeni watches Sidney carefully trail his fingertips along the top of the dining room table. Sidney is careful about everything he does. Purposeful. Outside a snow storm is building, like a wash of static. The kettle whistles.

Sidney is a slip of a silhouette in the darkness of Evgeni’s home.

His eyes are dark when he looks at Evgeni and Evgeni finds himself staying very still.

It’s a sheer instinctive response; something old and threaded in the marrow of his bones. Abstractly, he feels his breathing changes while Sidney’s stays the same. There is something sharp in his scent, something alive and focused entirely on Evgeni. It feels like they are on a precipice.

Everything is dark and quiet outside the pound of Evgeni’s heart. He feels like prey and he feels like the wolf that generations of royal and then public policy has tried to breed out of him.

And –

“It’s late,” Evgeni says quickly, his breathing shallow. “I take you home now.”

He isn’t sure if Sidney understands.

To be honest, he doesn’t stay to find out; going to the door and throwing on his coat and shoving his feet into his boots.

His breathing is quick. His heart is pounding in his ears.

He feels fragile and afraid and too much like he did when he came home from Moscow.

 

 

Magnitogorsk is a small town. His pack has long known the measure of him.

When he came home from Moscow, it was with his tail between his legs. Even now he isn’t sure how managed to avoid a formal charge of dissension of his post. It wouldn’t surprise him if Sasha stepped in, taking the hit in Evgeni’s stead. Though it’s equally likely that Fedorov intervened on Evgeni’s behalf. His reputation opens doors in every governmental department in Russia – across the world.

Fedorov is still up when Evgeni takes Sidney back home.

He smiles when he sees them and has tea ready for Evgeni when he comes downstairs.

Scattered on the table are maps of their territory. Some are very old and are showing it. For a while now some of the pack has been speaking to Fedorov about going through them properly to work out where the official and unofficial boundaries are. He may not have been born here, but he has an eye for detail.

“It’s more academic than anything else,” Fedorov admits.

It might be, but Fedorov has made time to do it.

“Want to help?” he says as Evgeni takes the offered mug of tea.

Evgeni shakes his head.

“I never had a pack like this when I was growing up,” Fedorov says, smoothing a hand over a map from the 1950s. “I had my family, but no one else. The only territory we had, if it counts, was the apartments we lived in.”

Evgeni can’t imagine that.

He could hardly stand the barracks he was assigned in Moscow. He says as much and Fedorov grins.

“It was better in Detroit. Most of us lived off base.”

“Do you like it here?” Evgeni finds himself asking.

Though the question is unplanned, Fedorov doesn’t seem surprised by it.

“Yes,” Fedorov answers simply.

He takes a sip of tea before setting it down.

“It’s different than I expected,” he says, “but I knew it would be.”  

Fedorov has only been the Metallurg Alpha for a little under a year. Before that, he made his name too many times over to count. Throughout the Old and New World his name was akin to legend. The pack may have chosen him, but equally, he chose their pack. Humble, wise and generous, he was one of Evgeni’s heroes when he was growing up. He’s still one of Evgeni’s heroes. His other, was Pavel – Pasha – Bure.

Pavel’s name is not spoken in Magnitogorsk.

That doesn’t stop it – him – coming up.

It’s been nearly half a year since Fedorov’s divorce. No one likes to speak of it.

“You can,” Fedorov says frankly. “I know people want to ask.”

Evgeni ducks his head.

He can’t. It wouldn’t be right.

Away in Moscow, Evgeni missed most of what happened. He came home to the aftermath, to Fedorov’s wordless compassion and the home that was always open to him. Shutter blind with his own heartache, Evgeni didn’t see like he now does. Now wherever he looks he can see the absence of Fedorov’s mate – mates. The home of the Metallurg alpha has always been a family home. Before his arrival, it had been altered inside and out for the family Fedorov was going to bring with him. The pack even built a tennis court in the garden. But he returned to Russia alone.

Evgeni came back to Magnitogorsk alone. He isn’t sure where he left the tatters of his heart. He isn’t sure he cares. It was never good for anything but giving away carelessly.

“Zhenya,” Fedorov says, his voice far too kind.

Evgeni looks at his hands. He feels young and stupid.

“How much do you know about Moscow?” he asks.

“Enough to know whatever you are thinking, whatever people said about you, it isn’t true.”

But it is.

It is.

“I loved them,” he finds himself saying, admitting, for the first time.

And he did. That’s the part that he sometimes wants to forget and sometimes worries he won’t remember.

Maybe he still loves them. He thinks of the dogs Alex rescued from the pound and the alley cats he would bring home. Each time Sasha would exchange a look with Evgeni, but Evgeni wasn’t much better. He isn’t any better now. Him and his stupid heart.

“I loved them too,” Fedorov says. “And I miss them.”

Evgeni bites back something akin to a sob.

“Does it get better?” he asks.

“I think so.”

Fedorov lays a comforting hand on Evgeni’s shoulder.

“It wasn’t anyone’s fault,” Fedorov says quietly. “And it isn’t wrong to love Sidney.”

Sid.

Evgeni’s throat goes tight.

Fedorov squeezes his shoulder.

“I –” Evgeni tries to say, but he doesn’t know what to say.

 

 

(And the thing is, Fedorov was right. He was right. All those months ago he took one look at Evgeni and knew. Evgeni might have a spare room, but he always wanted more.

The truly selfish part wants to keep Sidney. Keep his shy smiles and the green flecks in his hazel eyes and way he says Evgeni’s name – keep it all to himself.

The knowledge of that sinks like stone in Evgeni’s gut.)

 

 

Lost, Evgeni goes back to what he knows.

He trains and he finds comfort within his pack; with his brother who loves him and Nikolay who sees right through him, and his pack mates who happily distract him. Once or twice, they ask after Sidney, but – it’s easy to give an excuse.

He lasts maybe a week.

When it becomes too much, Evgeni crashes at Denis’ home. In the morning he wakes to the sound of his brother in the kitchen. The radio is on; more snow is being forecast.

“Fedorov called,” Denis tells him. “Waterway warfare training is cancelled.”

Evgeni yawns. It’s easy to fall back asleep.

A while later, Denis nudges Evgeni awake and hands him a bowl of porridge. It’s sweet, with honey spiralled over it.

“Are you staying today?” Denis asks.

Evgeni shrugs. It’s early still.

Last spring Denis began building his home. It set close to the mountains, at the edge of town. The nearest neighbour is within walking distance part the year, but not during winter. The house is small, with only a few rooms. Evgeni wasn’t there to see the foundations being poured or the structure going up. However he did spend the good part of three month fixing the roof when he returned from Moscow with his tail between his legs and without his stupid heart. It isn’t anything they talk about, but Evgeni owes Denis for that kindness. 

It’s been almost half a year since then.

Now Evgeni could talk about what happened, he thinks.

“Do you want to?” Denis asks.

Evgeni shrugs.

His hands clench.

What’s left of his heart beats inside his chest. It’s a different shape now. It fills his chest oddly at times. He tries not to think about it. It’s best when he doesn’t.

“There isn’t anything to say,” he settles on telling Denis.

It isn’t a lie. Everyone saw it coming. Everyone except for them.

(‘Them’ being Evgeni and Alex. ‘Them’ being past tense.)

Denis’ home is roughly furnished mostly with hand-me-downs donate from their family. Inside Evgeni can smell firewood, bacon, and the faint scent of Nikolay. Maybe they could talk about that instead.

Denis smiles and shakes his head. “Nothing new to talk about there.”

Outside, the wind picks up. In the distance, wolves howl. Denis cocks his head to the side to listen. He, like Evgeni, was brought up to be a soldier; to fight. However he was never meant for it. Growing up their neighbours used to talk about both of them. ‘Those Malkin boys,’ their neighbours would say. The tone of their voice said it all. They worry their parents. They both know that. Their hearts have always been wayward. Though Evgeni came home from Moscow, there will be a day Denis will go to the mountains and stay there.

“Not today,” Denis says softly.

Evgeni looks away.

“Not anytime soon,” Denis adds.

“You can’t promise that.”

Denis smiles. “You make promises.”

Evgeni isn’t sure his promises are worth anything anymore. Better than anyone, Evgeni knows he is thoughtless. Selfish. He does know that. He falls in love too easily and too hard. He falls in love with his best friends, and breaks his own heart twice over in the process.

“You saved Sid,” Denis says gently. “You kept that promise.”

Evgeni laughs. It comes out hollow, and turns into something he has to swallow.

He did promise that.

“Zhenya,” Denis says softly. “What happened in Chebarkul?”

Evgeni looks away.

He doesn’t know how to answer.

“I told Fedorov what happened,” he says instead.

And Fedorov told the pack the abridged version.

“You can tell me,” Denis says.

Evgeni thinks of the bunker and the sour taste of fear that he sometimes woke up tasting in the back of his mouth. He thinks of Sidney; hurt and objectified, the buyer who inspected him like he was a horse at market. A piece of flesh. A source of power to be put to use. For sale for a price.

“Mama and Papa were right,” he ends up saying. “Traders are no good.”

“Did they –?” Denis asks.

“I got him out,” Evgeni says, which is and isn’t an answer.

Denis nods. “You did.”

Evgeni got him out and bought him home. Only Magnitogorsk isn’t Sidney home. Evgeni finds himself letting himself forget that. The longer Sidney is here, the more it feels like he belongs with them; with Evgeni. Safe.

“It’s alright,” he says, but Evgeni isn’t sure if it is.

Denis lays his hand on Evgeni’s shoulder, his thumb resting against the tendon of his neck. It’s piano wire tight.

Glancing out the window, Denis hums. “The weather is turning.”

Evgeni tries to breathe. He looks out the window at the dark grey sky.

“The weather report said there was a blizzard coming.”

Denis nods.

“Do you have enough firewood to see you through?” Evgeni asks.

Denis shrugs. “Probably not.”

“Lazy,” Evgeni teases.

It’s weak as far as things go, but Denis doesn’t call him out. Instead Denis grins and somehow it leads to Evgeni chopping firewood for the next hour or so.  There is something soothing about the repetition of chopping up logs. Evgeni feels his mind slowly become quiet. After a while, he sheds his jacket, and then a jumper. The muscles in his shoulders and back start to ache with exertion. Above his head, the sky darkens. On each breath he can taste the incoming blizzard.

There is enough time to drive back into town; to go to his own home.

He lets that time pass.

He’s never been any good on his own.

 

 

(“It’s alright to care for him,” Denis says later.

Evgeni – “I – ” he starts to say.

Denis smiles. “Of course you do.”)

 

 

Evgeni goes home.

He goes home and he flips through his old school books. The ones he never paid enough attention to. His head too consumed with thoughts of brotherhood and stories pack victory against the darkness.

He looks at his school notes.

The simple phrases taught within the pages feel inadequate now.

Everything does; his heart, his head, his clumsy hands.

Evgeni struggles with the complexities of English. He learnt a little in school, and a little more with Alex and his friends in Moscow, but it’s not enough now. He hates how English words have all these different means and how, if they are placed in different order, can change the meaning.

He tries them out in his head. He tries, _I want you_. He tries, _I have never wanted anyone like I want you_. He closes his eyes and remembers the soft way Sidney sometimes looks at him. It’s only for a moment, only for a few seconds, but Evgeni remembers and thinks how the specificities of English have rendered him mute. 

Evgeni wonders sometimes how he can feels so much for someone he has hardly exchanged five words in the same language with.

He knows how Sidney has his tea and how he lets Evgeni close but no one else, how he’s skin is always slightly cold to the touch, how he moves, how he is something of winter rather than something made to withstand it like Evgeni is. These are all things Evgeni knows.

 

 

It snows. It keeps snowing.

From his room, Sidney watches. Snow collects on his window frame. The glass is frosted over when he wakes in the morning. With careful fingertips he traces the patterns it forms.

Outside the door of his room he hears Fedorov’s children.

Something inside him hurts. It’s an old hurt. The first one, he thinks.

When school is cancelled, he is roped into playing board games with them. The rules are unknown to him, but he picks them up along the way. The eldest daughter, Maria, explains them more than once. The youngest, Alina, doesn’t talk to him. He thinks she’s shy. It’s something he can understand. Or maybe she merely doesn’t want to talk to him. That too is something he can appreciate.

“You’re good with them,” Corrina says.

“Children are easy.”

“Easier than what?” she asks.

Sidney shrugs.

She’s been roped into playing board games too. On the table her kit of delicate tools are spread out. A tiny deco bedside clock awaits her attention. When the girls set aside the game for lunch, she gets back to work on it. Under her careful hands it is disassembled piece by piece. The clogs and wheels like puzzle pieces. There is something calming about watching her work.

Corrina smiles at him when he says as much.

She smiles and he –

Sometimes he forgets he is a fox in sheep’s clothing.

Sometimes he forgets what he is meant for.

It’s been a long time since Sidney was a civilian.

Arguably, he never was.

He’s been friends with people he’s fought with and friendly with people he’s found under. There are cadets from his youth that he kept in contact with after being drafted by Pittsburgh. But there isn’t anyone like Evgeni in his life. He’s Sidney’s best friend. Truest friend. He is – so bright and means so much to Sidney.

This life, here in Magnitogorsk, isn’t anything like his life in the West.

Sidney’s life was on the battlefield. It was deployments and mission. Dirt and blood and he was good at it. It is the only thing he’s ever been good at.

His magic still feels fractured inside him. But no one’s asked of it. Not even once. No one’s asked anything of him. They know his name – they know him, but they haven’t asked anything of him when they could. By right, they could ask. He is in their debt. Yet they don’t.

And he doesn’t think they will.

The snow is deep when he leaves the house in the dead of night. It’s slow going getting to the river. It is yet to freeze over. It will. Sidney knows it in his bones. It wouldn’t be difficult to make it freeze. He doesn’t though. He doesn’t even try.

The ley lines haven’t altered. He doesn’t have to try them to know that.

The night is dark but there are stars above him. He listens to the sound of the river.

His heart beats. And beats.

A wet nose presses against his hand.

Evgeni.

Zhenya.

Sidney – he’s never – he’s not good at things like this – he takes a breath.

“Home?” he asks.

Evgeni bumps his body against Sidney’s thighs in answer.

And Sidney nods.  

 

 

It’s late when Evgeni gets Sidney back to his place. Maybe he could have taken him back to Fedorov’s, but Evgeni doesn’t. He leaves Sidney in the entrance and pads up to his room to shift and get dressed. When he comes back down, Sidney had taken off his coat and left it by the door. Fumbling around the kitchen, Evgeni watches him turn on the kettle. He looks up with Evgeni steps closer.

There is something soft in his eyes when Evgeni hands him two mugs, and it renders Evgeni mute.

There aren’t words for Sidney. At least not any Evgeni knows.

There isn’t, wasn’t, much softness in Sidney either – but there is now, and Evgeni can’t help but be drawn closer.

Sidney’s skin is a little translucent under the kitchen bench light. Up close, Evgeni thinks he doesn’t need to touch him to feel him. A foot apart, he can practically feel the beat of his heart as clearly as he can hear it.

“Sid,” he says, because he isn’t sure if Sidney wants this when so much that has brought Sidney into Evgeni’s life was done against Sidney’s will. Evgeni doesn’t want this to be something Sidney is made to carry upon his shoulders.

“Can I?” Evgeni asks.

Sidney pupils dilate. Even now, even in Evgeni’s kitchen, dressed in hand-me-downs, Sidney is very wild. Evgeni might be afraid, if he wasn’t so humbled.

There is a moment where Evgeni thinks he should step away, step back. But then Sidney reaches and touches Evgeni’s hip. Evgeni can hardly feel Sidney’s touch; it’s that light.

Inside his chest, Evgeni’s heart begins to race. 

It is like that – with his heart racing and a storm raging – Sidney tilts his head up and gently presses his lips to Evgeni’s.

 

  

The first time Evgeni has Sidney in his bed, his den, Evgeni – with one fluid movement, pulls Sidney’s sweater over his head. There is another sweater underneath it. It’s smaller and a little threadbare. It was Evgeni’s once, and he likes very much that it is now Sidney’s. One layer and then another and then he has Sidney undressed.

And – it’s so much, having Sidney pressed against the dark cotton of Evgeni’s sheet. His eyes dark and hair mussed, naked and unsure.

Over the months Sidney’s been with them, he has picked up some Russian. Or maybe started using the Russian he already somehow knew. It sounds jagged from his mouth. Sometimes he is too embarrassed to use it. Equally Evgeni’s classroom English may have improved, but he was never taught how to ask for things like the things he wants. He fumbles now.

Sidney is inexperienced, Evgeni knows this. But he – when Sidney says ‘I’ve never,’ Evgeni hopes he understands what Sidney means.

His blood roars in his ears.

He is a wild creature too.

Sidney smells of a tangled mix of anxiety and nerves and want. His heart is a rapid, skittering burst of staccato beats that fill Evgeni’s ears. Settling between Sidney’s pale thighs, Evgeni rests one hand on the curve of Sidney’s waist and ducks his head down to press his temple in the crock of Sidney’s neck. Breathing it all in, Evgeni feels light hearted and he knows. He’s known for a long time now.

“Sid,” he says.

Sidney’s hands find the back of his neck and for a moment he holds Evgeni close.

Evgeni releases a shaky breath.

There are blinkers on his eyes.

The slope of Sidney’s spine, the arch of his back, the curve of his hip, the way his dick hardens between them; Evgeni learns it with his hands and his mouth and it undoes Evgeni. He wants to bare his neck, he wants to bite; instead Sidney rolls him onto his back and kisses him. Flushed and dark eyed, he is so pretty, and Evgeni would let him do anything, have anything he wanted.

When they fuck, Evgeni’s nerves are raw. He tries to be gentle, tries not to rush Sidney. Sidney’s heartbeat – his scent – tether Evgeni and humble him when all he wants is to bite down and take. He wants it to be good. Wants Sidney to feel good.

But Evgeni isn’t good.

He’s never been much good. Everyone’s always known this, apart from Sidney.

He fucks Sidney bare and when he comes, it’s to the thought of marking Sidney with his scent.

Undone, he shudders against Sidney and gasps for breath. Underneath him, he feels Sidney’s heart begins to slow.

Sidney whimpers when Evgeni pulls out and he is trembling a little when Evgeni runs his hands over him, touching the tangles in his hair and his flushed cheeks, the cooling cum on his chest and belly, and feeling the rise and fall of his ribcage beneath his hand.  Navigating the points of his body that are now known, and trying to see if there is any damage wrought.

“Sid?” Evgeni asks, afraid.

Sidney hesitates for a moment, but he clenches his fingers into Evgeni’s hair and Evgeni feels himself tremble a little too. Evgeni knows, probably even from the very beginning what Sidney was to him. He gathers Sidney in his arms and tangles their legs together.

There is a strange and awkward fragility to Sidney afterwards that draws Evgeni close, as if he doesn’t know quite what to do now.

Evgeni isn’t sure what to do either.

“Okay?” he asks.

Sidney nods. “You?”

And – Evgeni wants to say so much. His throat goes tight.

He nods. “Yes.”

 

 

(They sleep like that; tangled with each other).

 

 

At night they walk through the city streets, once or twice until dawn. Sometimes Evgeni catches himself thinking; he’s touched the skin beneath Sidney’s clothes, touches the planes of skin Sidney does not show. Evgeni’s heard him gasp and knows what his name sounds like on Sidney’s lips.

Alone, Evgeni practices English words and phrases he never uses.

At Fedorov’s, he sits with Sidney at dinner and watches Fedorov’s girls watch Sidney. It has been months now, and although Sidney is no longer quite the novelty he once was, they are fascinated by the way his gaze shifts from them to the windows and doorways and how he knows exactly where they are at all times.

“How can he hear us?” they ask Evgeni, their small paws padding almost silently across the hardwood floors.

“Magic,” Evgeni tells them; because that is the answer he thinks he would have appreciated as a child.

And they do appreciate it.

“He is the changeling prince, you know,” Evgeni adds, to their delight.

Sidney allows them closer than almost anyone. For all that he is made of sharp edges and battle worn eyes; he has never given Fedorov or his pack any reason to distrust him. It’s unsaid, but he has a place here with their pack. When the time is right, they all know Fedorov will speak to Sidney about it. So to, does Sidney have a home with Evgeni if he wants it; he has Evgeni, if he wants him.

When Evgeni takes Sidney back to his place again, Sidney is jumpy and when Evgeni kisses him, his teeth clang with Evgeni, cutting his lip. Hissing, he touches the cut with his tongue. The sound his makes Evgeni falter.

“Sorry,” Sidney says. He looks embarrassed.

He shouldn’t be.

“It’s okay,” Evgeni says, pressing the words into Sidney’s skin, pressing a kiss against the side of Sidney’s neck.

Sidney shakes his head, bringing a hand up to his mouth.

Evgeni knows now, what he had suspected before. Instincts run deep, but to think of Sidney allowing Evgeni close, allowing Evgeni to touch him – when he probably never allowed anyone else that privilege shakes Evgeni to the bone.  

When he undresses Sidney, Evgeni’s hands shake and his head is full of the scent of Sidney’s slow burn arousal.

All he hears is Sidney’s shallow breathing, and all he sees is the gentle curve of Sidney’s back when he steps close to unbutton Evgeni’s jeans. Naked, Sidney is bright in the low light of Evgeni’s bedroom. The ancient part of Evgeni’s mind, the part that makes him howl under the moon and run through the forest until exhaustion wants to kneel and tilt his head so to bare his neck. He places his hand on Sidney’s hips and maybe Sidney doesn’t know what he is doing, but between the two of them they figure it out.

Afterwards, Evgeni falls asleep to the sound of Sidney heartbeat.

 

 

There are things Evgeni can’t tell him. 

Some things don’t translate well.

Some things can’t be articulated.

In the light of dawn Evgeni says, ‘mate.’

And Sidney says, ‘mine.’

It isn’t exactly the same thing, but it was never going to be.

 

 

After a fortnight of particularly heavy snowfalls, Nikolay drops by. The roads aren’t clear, but there is a glint in his dark eyes.

“I don’t know why anyone thinks you’re the sensible one,” Evgeni says, because he knows that look.

Nikolay shrugs.

Cabin fever gets to all of them.

A group of them all end up near the edge of the old city line, just where the river widens. The first to strip down is Nikolay, who begins by looping his scarf around Sidney’s neck.

“To stop you catching a chill,” he says; the corner of his mouth twitches.

Sidney looks like he might laugh. He does when a few other pack mates try to do the same thing. He isn’t human and he doesn’t feel the cold, but he still ends with a thick fur cap over his knitted beanie and wearing an extra jacket.

From the shore he laughs as they charge into the water. Some shift, others don’t  – yet all yelp when they enter the chilly water. Evgeni yells insults and laughs. It’s all stupid but no one cares.

“Go,” Sidney tells Evgeni with a grin.

Dmitir whines and Evgeni makes sure to shake snow onto him when he rises from the water.

“Bully,” Denis says, grabbing Evgeni by the scruff of his neck and shaking him just a little.

Evgeni is, maybe a little. But no more than his pack mates deserve. Especially not when they have taken to teasing him about Sidney. Each of them donated clothes to him, and they delight reminding Evgeni. From a hundred paces they identify jumpers and jeans, pointing them out to Evgeni.

“A good pack provides for its members,” Denis says, which should be the end of the matter.

Only it isn’t, because Nikolay pipes up.

“Very traditional,” he adds, because he always starts it.

Traditional or not, they get mouthy when Evgeni puts his jacket over Sidney’s shoulders. Evgeni takes less care with the rest of his clothes and does his best to splash all of them when he barrels into the river.

Afterwards, Sidney throws a woollen blanket at Evgeni when he emerges from the water. But not before he and Nikolay roll around in the snow. It’s crazy and stupid and Evgeni tackles Sidney while he’s laughing. Sidney doesn’t stop him.

“Mean,” Evgeni says, and then he tries to bite Sidney.

Elbowing him, Sidney wrestles his way free. Evgeni doesn’t stop him. He lets himself be pushed onto his back, and grins like he won. Sidney can’t help but kiss him.

It’s easy as breathing.

Behind them, his pack mates catcall.

Because Evgeni is Evgeni, he presses his advantage; teasingly tracing Sidney’s bottom lip with his tongue and leaving him breathless. Then, as Sidney opens his mouth to deepen the kiss, Evgeni pulls away and starts swearing at them over Sidney’s shoulder. It’s utterly infuriating.

It isn’t much better on the drive back. In the backseat of Nikolay’s car, Evgeni’s wet hair drips on the woollen blanket he has wrapped around his shoulders. His hands are cold in Sidney’s and he hasn’t stopped talking. Or bickering. Nikolay clearly is baiting him.

Evgeni only shuts up when they are at home; pulling Sidney into the shower with him. Under the hot spray of water he touches Sidney’s chest, his waist, before he uses both of his hands to cradle Sidney’s jaw and kiss him. Sidney’s heart is races and it’s so much. He’s never wanted anyone or anything as much as he wants Evgeni.

When Evgeni breaks away to breath, his eyes are so bright.

“So pretty,” he tells Sidney breathlessly.

Pressing Sidney against the tiles, Evgeni rocks his hips against Sidney’s. As he does, Sidney can feel his cock hardening against Evgeni’s own. Sidney doesn’t really know what he’s doing. Evgeni doesn’t seem to care. With his dick pressed into the slick crease of Sidney’s hips, he mostly kisses Sidney and Sidney tries his best to kiss him back. Neither of them are very coordinated and at one point Evgeni almost slips. His reactions are good though; sharper than even Sidney’s. Catching himself easily, he grins like it’s the best trick.

There is a lot of bluff and show to Evgeni. Sidney – this is new to him, but he thinks maybe some things are new to Evgeni as well. Threading his fingers through Evgeni’s hair, Sidney holds him still, just for a moment.

“Okay?” Sidney asks, because it feels important.

“Yes,” Evgeni says, in Russian and then in English.

 “Me too,” Sidney tells him.

Somehow this makes him laughs, and Sidney likes that, so much.

“Best,” Evgeni says. There is something so very wild in his eyes.  

Dropping to his knees, he presses his mouth to the cut of Sidney’s hips, his fingertips digging into Sidney’s thighs.

“Fuck,” Sidney swears.

Evgeni’s mouth is hot and he nips at Sidney’s thighs before mouthing Sidney’s dick. Sidney’s knees almost give out, but Evgeni holds him up; strong and confident, though not particularly skilled when he sucks the head of Sidney’s dick into his mouth. He’s not particularly careful with his teeth either, but Sidney doesn’t care. Evgeni doesn’t care either, when Sidney rocks his hips.

Sidney’s fingers flex against his side and he doesn’t think he can last long.

But Evgeni pulls away just as Sidney feels himself starting to get close.

As he does, Sidney hears himself let out a plaintive whine.

“Bed,” Evgeni says. “I want you to fuck me.”

And – yes. Bed.

The bed is too far away. Sidney thinks Evgeni turns off the water, and maybe it’s Sidney who grabs at the towels. He is a beat behind Evgeni the entire time. His mouth goes dry when he finds Evgeni sprawls out on his unmade bed. All long limbs, dark eyes, and pale thighs; Sidney settles between them when Evgeni pulls him down onto the mattress with him. His cock is thick and hard, curved and resting against his stomach while his dark hair is wet and knotted around his head. Sidney’s can’t think. Even if he could, he wouldn’t even know where to begin. He says as much and he thinks Evgeni understands.

“I show,” he says.

Evgeni bites his bottom lip like he said too much. Taking a breath, Sidney decides he can be bold. With one hand he cradles Evgeni’s jaw and strokes his thumb over Evgeni’s cheekbone. He’s flushed and maybe embarrassed. It’s hard to tell. Maybe both. But his eyes are so dark and his mouth is spit slick.

Beneath him, Evgeni exhales shakily.

“Let me,” he tells Sidney. Or maybe asks.

Sidney nods.

He watches as Evgeni fiddles with his lube. Nerves maybe get the best of him. He fumbles as he presses one slick finger inside himself. He puts his other hand on his cock and jerks himself as he fucks himself with a second and then a third finger in quick succession. He isn’t careful and he hisses at the stretch.

“Can I?” Sidney asks.

Evgeni whines.

Sidney wants him. Wants everything.

He tries to pay attention when Evgeni closes his hand around Sidney’s and shows him how to touch him. He’s so hot and responsive. He makes small sounds as Sidney traces a fingertip around his rim before pressing it inside. He’s breathing hard by the time Sidney works up to two fingers, and rocking against them. Fucking himself on them.

“Ready,” he tells Sidney.

“Yeah?”

Evgeni nods.  

Carefully removing his fingers, Sidney wipes the excess lube on Evgeni’s sheets. Nervous, he tries to line himself up. Reaching between them, Evgeni helps. With one hand he spreads lube on Sidney’s cock and guides him close.

“Like this,” he says quietly.

He’s breath hitches as Sidney presses his cock inside. Swallowing hard, Sidney moves slowly, carefully. He can’t take his eyes off Evgeni. With white knuckles, he is grasping the sheets so tightly. Tighter than Sidney is gripping knee with one hand while the other is braced by Evgeni’s shoulder. Stopping, Sidney waits. He tries to breathe. It takes a while for Evgeni to relax. Exhaling slowly, Evgeni shifts hips a little as he gets used to the feeling of having Sidney inside him.

“Move,” he tells Sidney, when he is ready.

Cautiously, Sidney rocks his hips, thrusting his cock in and out. His movements are uncertain. He is unsure. Whatever rhythm they initially have is uneven, and awkward. Then Evgeni tilts his hip and brings his knees up to Sidney’s waist. Reading him, Sidney doesn’t hesitate. He grabs Evgeni and easily supports his weight. The change in angle makes Evgeni whine on Sidney’s next thrust. Instinctively, Sidney follows Evgeni’s lead. Rocking against him, Evgeni makes more soft sounds as Sidney moves; picking up his pace and thrusting harder.

Writhing, Evgeni swears.

He can’t hold back the noise he makes as Sidney cock drags against his prostate. Blindly, he bites at Sidney’s mouth, his jaw, the taut muscles in his neck. The sharp flashes of pain make Sidney gasp and momentarily lose rhythm. Underneath him, Evgeni reaches for the base of his dick and squeezes. Flushed and breathing hard, he arches up against Sidney. With one hand, Sidney pushes Evgeni’s away from his dick and strokes him ruthlessly.

It doesn’t take much.

Coming in a rush, Evgeni whimpers. His voice breaking as he does.

Breathing hard, Sidney ceases moving. He has to consciously stop himself from rocking into Evgeni as his internal muscles clench and release on his cock. Ducking his head, Sidney rests his temple against the hollow of Evgeni’s throat.

His heart is like thunder in his ears.

He doesn’t know how much time passes.

“Can keep going,” Evgeni says, pleads, his voice hoarse. “It’s okay. I want.”

He repeats himself in English when Sidney doesn’t move.

Sidney groans and Evgeni strokes his hand down Sidney’s side. Gentling him as if he were – Sidney doesn’t know what. When he moves it is without any grace; he only manages a dozen or so thrusts before whatever rhythm is lost and he comes. Collapsing, he feels Evgeni hold him. His voice soft and soothing – Sidney can’t understand what Evgeni is saying, but it sounds tender.

Inside Sidney’s chest his heart beats, and with his last remaining strength, he manages to press a tender kiss against the side of Evgeni’s neck.

 

 

Before the bad weather breaks, Sidney tells Evgeni his name.

Evgeni doesn’t even realise what Sidney is saying at first.

“Yes,” Evgeni says, naively. “You are Sidney.”

Sidney nods, his eyes serious. “Yes.”

It is only later Evgeni realise what Sidney said, and what he meant.

Names are powerful things. Knowing them and giving them are meaningful.

When they go to bed that night, Evgeni stays awake for a long time. With his cheek pressed against Sidney’s sharp shoulder blades, Evgeni holds him and thinks of trust and how scared Sidney had been in the beginning.

Pressing a kiss to the back of Sidney’s neck, Evgeni whispers. “Thank you.”

Sidney doesn’t say anything, instead he settles and maybe that’s Evgeni’s answer.

 

 

(Neither of them has ever needed too many words to understand each other.)

 

 

 

**Epilogue.**

_That’s how language dies, because it doesn’t need to be spoken._

Louise Glück, ‘ _Amazons_.’

 

_Sharpened at all hours is the knife_

Edna St. Vincent Millay, from Collected Poems; _Ragged Island_.

 

 

Towards the tail end of winter when the worst of the snow and ice has begun to melt, Evgeni knows he can’t put it off any longer. The roads have been re-opened for a while now, but it’s been easy to forget there is a world outside of Magnitogorsk. It’s easy really, to forget there is a world outside of the curve of Sidney’s neck and his scent on Evgeni’s skin.

To his credit, Fedorov hasn’t pushed. Nor has the pack.

“These things take time,” he says without being prompted when Evgeni and his parents comes by for dinner. 

Evgeni doesn’t know. Maybe he should disagree.

It’s been months, almost a full season, since the rumours of Sidney’s fall began to circulate. Yet here he is, half a world away from the front lines and alive. Sidney’s reappearance still makes no sense, not when the borders between the Old and New Worlds are airtight – or were thought to be. 

Evgeni should take Sidney to Moscow – to Alex. He should have taken Sidney there months ago.

It was easy when Sidney was hurt to take him to Magnitogorsk.

“Instinct,” Fedorov corrects.

Perhaps. Perhaps not. That too is difficult to infer even in hindsight.

From the kitchen, they watch Sidney get pulled around by Fedorov’s daughters. 

Maybe it doesn’t matter. Not when he gets to sleep by his side and wakes slowly each morning to Sidney curled next to him – not when Sidney has given him his name and Evgeni has trusted him with what is left of his heart.

“In Spring,” Fedorov says. “We will wait until then.”

Spring.

Evgeni nods.

 

 

It is only when the last of the ice has melted does Evgeni begins to make plans to take Sidney to Moscow.

“Moscow?” Sidney asks when they tell him.

Evgeni nods.

“Alexander Ovechkin wants to meet you,” Nikolay says.

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Find/follow me on [tumblr](http://www.pr-scatterbrain.tumblr.com) if you want <3
> 
> I also have a tag for this verse on my tumblr: [supernatural au](http://pr-scatterbrain.tumblr.com/tagged/supernatural-au). It's full of images, quotes, music, and things that inspired this verse.


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